Revenge of the Left
Uri Elitzur - from column in Yediot Ahronot titled Duchafit as an Omen 10
August 2007

The evacuation and violence this week in Hebron wasn't an exceptional
unprecedented event. Veteran Hebronites remember scores of similar
incidents. But something very deep has changed and it must not be ignored.
Two years have passed since the terrible trauma of the expulsion from Gush
Katif, two years in which it became increasingly clear from day to day just
how savage and useless this destruction was.

In these two years the impression strengthens that the State of Israel
plucked, expelled and destroyed flowering communities, set to fire
synagogues and study halls and removed the dead for their graves mostly for
one purpose: revenge of the Left against the settlers. In moments of
candor, some of the spokespeople of the Left and leading opinion makers
openly admit it. Others cover it over with high words about the rule of law
and the holiness of democracy, but the truth comes out from between the
lines of their words then and now. This is a holy war, a secular jihad,
against religious Zionism.

The secular left elite has brought to bear all the tools in its possession
in the service of this holy war - the power of the media, its almost
complete control of the justice system, their tremendous influence in the
academic world - while it is willing to forego all of its other principles
for the sake of the jihad against the settlers - among them the rule of law,
the war against corruption, human rights, and democratic fairness.

The most prominent and memorable betrayal of principles in the service of
the jihad was the phenomenon of the etrog [AL: Sharon protected from
criminal prosecution and not criticized for corruption] and the fierce and
uncompromising objection to a national referendum [AL: before the retreat
from Gaza]. For many in the religious Zionist camp, and particularly, the
young, this was an earthquake whose tsunami waves are only now starting to
strike the shores. Duchafit was only an omen. It would be good to pay
attention to it.