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Rift between right, left in Israel reaches new heights

A new study shows that 22.5% of Israeli Jews consider the political left to be "dangerous."
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (C) arrives at a Likud party meeting at the Knesset, the Israeli parliament, in Jerusalem January 16, 2017. Picture taken January 16, 2017. REUTERS/Ronen Zvulun - RTSW82I
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One of the Likud Party's more provocative campaign ads from the 2015 elections features armed Islamic State militants driving a small pickup truck in Israel. The militants stop to ask a kind Israeli driver how to get to Jerusalem. He answers, "Go left." The message was clear. The left will be weak against terrorism, letting IS into the country. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu personally led the campaign, approving every ad and statement and maximizing use of its theme: the danger posed by the left. Netanyahu wasn't the only politician to make use of that motif, but he was undoubtedly the most sophisticated.

A new study — "Stop Dismantling, Start Putting Together," presented April 3 by the leaders of Pnima (Inside, in Hebrew) to mark the launch of their new movement — suggests that the right's campaign to delegitimize the left has been effective. Pnima's leaders include former Israel Defense Forces Chiefs of Staff Benny Gantz and Gabi Ashkenazi and former Education Minister Shai Piron. They go to great lengths to talk about the risks posed by the growing rifts in Israeli society, chief among them the one between right and left, but one astonishing statistic cuts through their high-minded language: 22.5% of Jews in Israel believe that the left is dangerous. The very idea has far-reaching implications.

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