Border Police sharpshooter Sgt. First Class Barel Hadaria Shmueli was shot Aug. 21 at point-blank range during Palestinian rioting on the border fence with the Gaza Strip. On Aug. 30, he succumbed to his wounds and died. The incident had generated public controversy over the deployment of soldiers near the Gaza fence and over fire-opening instructions. More so, it has been shaking up the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and Israel’s political echelons. One could say that the final bastion has crumbled. In the wake of Shmueli’s killing, the political right and especially followers of former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu have targeted the last remaining sacred cow of the Israeli ethos: the IDF.
This attack in social media reflects ongoing attempts by Netanyahu and his supporters to call into question the legitimacy of all official Israeli institutions. Their goal is clear: to erode the already fragile legitimacy of Prime Minister Naftali Bennett and his government. Many observers believed this wild, relentless onslaught by Netanyahu’s associates would come to a halt before crashing into the military, which many Israelis still view as a symbol of national consensus. They were wrong. Even when he was vacationing in Hawaii, Netanyahu had no qualms about exploiting the tragic killing for his own political needs.
The shooting occurred as Palestinians were preparing for a large protest march along the border in northern Gaza. Israeli troops were deployed in large numbers, but due to faulty intelligence the force commanders failed to foresee that the Palestinian masses would storm the fence. During the melee that followed, a member of Hamas pulled out a gun he had hidden in his pants. He stuck it through a small opening in the fortified wall used by Israeli sharpshooters to push back rioters, firing off a number of bullets that hit Shmueli in the head.
The sight of a Palestinian shooting an Israeli soldier point-blank, caught live on cameras, set off a public storm, which quickly shifted from the military battle field to the political one. The first to signal this shift was none other than opposition leader Netanyahu, who was vacationing on the Hawaiian island of Lanai owned by billionaire Oracle Corp. founder Larry Ellison. The two were seen dining at an island restaurant.
AL-MONITOR All-Access gives you unlimited access to all our journalism, the full Daily Briefing, exclusive interviews, premium newsletters, and live events — for less than $2/week.
