The Israeli Right Wants to End America's Israel Bipartisanship

Bibi spoke before Congress today, giving his usual bluster in the face of growing Democratic discontent over his hard-right governance and naked disregard for Palestinian life and rights. Well over a hundred congressional Democrats boycotted his speech, and even some who attended gave scathing reviews (my favorite comment came from Rep. Jerry Nadler, who bluntly described Netanyahu as "the worst leader in Jewish history since the Maccabean king who invited the Romans into Jerusalem over 2100 years ago.").

One comment I've heard many times is that Bibi has been recklessly pissing away the historic bipartisan support Israel has enjoyed in Congress to tie himself ever closer to the GOP. This has been occurring since at least the Obama administration and only seems to be accelerating. Why is he taking this step? At the bad place, Abe Silberstein hypothesizes that this is a "calculated" decision, predicated on the notion that Democrats will eventually abandon Israel anyway. I agree it is calculated (which doesn't mean it isn't reckless), but I actually might make an even more controversial point -- Bibi wants to drive Democrats away. The breakdown of the consensus is, for him, a positive good.

The rationale is straightforward. Certainly, in an "ideal" world, both American political parties would support Israel in whatever it does, all the time. But in reality, a bipartisan "consensus" around Israel is going to be inherently moderating -- Democrats prevent it from drifting too far to the right, and Republicans from it drifting too far to the left. It's no accident that in the early 2000s (the apex of the consensus), Democrats and Republicans alike generally coalesced around things like support for two states, veneration of Oslo, and so on. There was, certainly, a lot less in the way of Democratic support for sharp and harsh Israel critique, but you were also less likely to see Republicans openly come out in favor of occupation forever. It was the epitome of a mushy middle.

The problem is that Bibi is not part of the mushy middle, and it is affirmatively bad for him if American politics on Israel sit on moderate, middle ground. A theme I've hit on repeatedly in my writing is that polarization actively benefits extremists, and will be pursued by them, even if it reduces overall levels of popular support for their broadly-defined "camp". Polarization gives more space for extremists to flourish, and Bibi is nothing if not a right-wing extremist.

Imagine you're Bibi and you have a choice between two worlds: one where 8 out of 10 Americans support Israel, but they're evenly divided between "left" and "right", and another where only 5 out of 10 Americans are pro-Israel, but 4 of them are conservative. He's going to pick the latter, because in the latter universe the pro-Israel faction is dominated by conservatives, and so will be a far more hospitable environment to his brand of unabashed and unapologetic conservatism. In the first world, the parameters of pro-Israel are set via a balance of liberal and conservative interests. In the second, they're set solely by conservatives -- even as the median position of Americans shifts away from support for Israel, the median position of self-described pro-Israel Americans shifts sharply to the right. 

For that reason, it should not surprise to see Bibi and his allies seemingly doing everything they can to alienate American Democrats even in the face of stalwart support from Joe Biden. Are they spitting in his eye? Yes, and intentionally so. For them, having Democrats as part of the "pro-Israel" camp is more constraining than it is enabling. They'd much rather the parameters of pro-Israel be set solely by the right -- the better to consolidate their own power.