The State of the Israeli Right

Summary

Podcast Summary: For Heaven’s Sake – “The State of the Israeli Right”

Podcast: For Heaven’s Sake
Host: Shalom Hartman Institute
Date: December 3, 2025
Hosts: Donniel Hartman and Yossi Klein Halevi
Theme: The State of the Israeli Right

---

Overview

This episode delves deep into the evolution, core beliefs, and internal challenges of the Israeli right—focusing particularly on its mainstream, non-religious dimensions. Donniel Hartman and Yossi Klein Halevi analyze how the right’s identity has changed over time, the consequences of long-term Netanyahu dominance, and the right’s current struggles between ideology and personal loyalty. They also discuss the right’s future: its challenges in leadership, articulating clear policies, and upholding the traditional values of dignity (hadar) and moral responsibility. This thoughtful discussion highlights not just the political, but also the cultural and ethical stakes in the right’s trajectory.

---

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. What is “The State of the Israeli Right”? (00:09–04:22)

• Play on Words: The title refers both to Israel as a state governed by the right and to an examination of the right’s current “state” or condition (00:40).
• Political Shift: Israel has become predominantly center-right, with 50–60% of the population supporting right-wing ideals excluding Arab/Palestinian parties (01:52, 02:00).
• Focus: The conversation zeroes in on mainstream right parties—Likud, Bennett’s party, and Yisrael Beiteinu—leaving out religious Zionist and ultra-Orthodox factions (03:35–04:11).

2. Historical Roots: Security and the Wholeness of the Land (04:52–11:17)

• Jabotinsky’s Dual Pillars: Core right-wing commitments were “security” (“iron wall” doctrine) and keeping the land of Israel territorially whole. (05:27–07:18)
  • “One was security, which Jabotinsky defined as the Iron Wall... The second foundational principle… is territorial wholeness.” – Yossi Klein Halevi (05:27–06:17)
• Inclusivity: Likud’s incorporation of Jews from diverse backgrounds (religious, secular, Mizrahi, Ashkenazi) thanks to these unifying values (09:01–09:10).
• Cultural Flexibility: The right included both religious and secular Jews, forming a broad umbrella movement (07:27–09:10).

3. Evolving The Right: From Principle to Personality (11:17–14:03)

• Netanyahu’s Influence: The emergence of a faction loyal to Netanyahu as a personality, separate from ideological principles (Just Netanyahu group) (11:19–12:18).
  • “He is the person who I'll place my future in his hands. You can't define the right without connecting it to the man who for a generation has led it.” – Donniel Hartman (12:13–12:18)
• “Just Not Netanyahu” Right: A growing camp rejecting Netanyahu’s dominance, seeking a return to principle-driven politics (13:29–14:03).
• Tension: Some of Netanyahu’s adversaries within the right (Bennett, Lieberman) were once close allies, now representing non-personalist right-wing leadership (14:03–14:10).

4. The Zamir Example & Right-wing Appointees (14:11–17:19)

• Zamir: A case study in principled right-wing leadership, not beholden to Netanyahu; illustrates tension within the right between loyalty and ideology (15:24–16:21).
• Supreme Court Appointees: Right-wing judges act independently of party expectation, prioritizing law over partisan loyalty—much to the surprise and frustration of the hard-right (16:21–17:19).
  • “They actually worry about the rule of law.” – Donniel Hartman (16:42)

5. Personalization vs. Principles—A Cultural Loss (17:22–23:41)

• Personalization Dangers: The shift to backing personalities (Netanyahu) rather than values or policies leads to the erosion of founding right-wing ideals (18:40–19:44).
• The Concept of Hadar: Jabotinsky’s value of “dignity” (hadar), once core to the right, has been eroded in the Netanyahu era.
  • “Jabotinsky defined this in one word: hadar. Hadar means dignity. In its more grandiose, majesty.” – Yossi Klein Halevi (00:09–00:14/19:44–19:48)
  • “And when I look at what Netanyahu has done to this Likud, he has destroyed Hadar.” – Yossi Klein Halevi (00:24/19:50)
• Historic Right-wing Role Models: Menachem Begin exemplified dignity—his resignation after the Lebanon War standing in stark contrast to today (23:02–23:09).

6. Mamlachtiyut—Statehood and Integrity (23:41–24:39)

• State Ethos: Ben Gurion’s mamlachtiyut (dignity of state/power) was a shared value across the spectrum, absorbed in different ways by both right and left (23:41–24:39).
• Erosion Under Netanyahu: The rule of law and state institutions lose their dignity when loyalty to political leaders supersedes institutional integrity.

7. The Right’s Challenges: Defining Purpose, Not Just Opposition (24:39–30:45)

• Policy Articulation: Can the right transform from a politics of “no” to a movement with concrete, proactive policies—especially regarding foreign policy, Palestinian issues, and regional alignment? (24:39–29:57)
  • “The right wing, what are my policies, what am I willing to do? And how could I lead? Not just how could I say no, no, no...” – Donniel Hartman (29:57–30:45)
• Morality vs. Security: A dangerous false dichotomy has arisen between security and morality, especially on the far-right.
  • “This dichotomy between security and morality is really a dichotomy of the ultra right, ultranationalist. It's not a right wing dichotomy.” – Donniel Hartman (29:25)

8. Healing and the Need for a Responsible Right (30:45–34:21)

• Leadership Crisis: Healing requires the right to re-embrace substantive, ideological debate and clear policy vision.
  • “In order for healing to begin in Israel, we need to have, again, a credible right.” – Yossi Klein Halevi (34:14)
• Contrast With Religious Zionists: While disagreements run deep, at least the religious right still stands for something—unlike the contemporary Likud, described as sycophantic and devoid of debate (31:40–32:54).

9. The Value of Rivalry and Healthy Debate (33:10–34:21)

• Importance of a Strong Opposition: A vigorous, values-driven right keeps other political camps honest and sharp, enriching Israeli democracy.
  • “You want a debate between Menachem Begin and Shimon Peres, Yitzchak Shamir and Yitzhak Rabin. That's what you want, regardless of which side of that debate you're on.” – Yossi Klein Halevi (33:26–33:36)
• Wider Context: The erosion of constructive, respectful rivalry afflicts Israeli, American, and global politics.

10. Closing Reflections (34:21–35:31)

• Adapting to New Realities: The right’s future relevance depends on its ability to create coalitions and articulate a shared vision—grounded in dignity, morality, and honest debate.
  • “If the right wing is going to lead us... we’re going to have to adapt to forces in the world that are going to push us in places that we haven’t thought about.” – Donniel Hartman (34:21)

---

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Hadar (Dignity):

  • “Jabotinsky defined this in one word: hadar. Hadar means dignity. In its more grandiose, majesty. And when I look at what Netanyahu has done to this Likud, he has destroyed Hadar.” – Yossi Klein Halevi (00:09–00:24 / 19:44–19:50)
  • “The hymn of Bethar, which to this day I hear it and I get chills involuntarily… Jabotinsky, who wrote the hymn, has a line in there about a Hebrew, even in poverty is a prince.” – Yossi Klein Halevi (20:20–21:34)

• On Evolution of Values:

  • “If you were committed to these two principles, the Iron Wall, impenetrable security and the wholeness of the land, you were on the right… there always was this sense on the right of, of we don't care what you are, we don't care what you believe or don't believe. You can be secular, you can be an atheist, you can be religious.” – Yossi Klein Halevi (07:27–09:34)

• Critique of Personalism:

  • “The shift to backing personalities… rather than values or policies leads to the erosion of founding right-wing ideals.” – Paraphrased, based on main points from 17:22–19:44

• On Political Debate:

  • “I think that what defines a healthy politics is when you look at your rival camp and you want them to be the best version of themselves because they help keep you honest, they help sharpen your arguments.” – Yossi Klein Halevi (33:14–33:30)

---

Timestamps for Key Segments

• [00:09–01:52] – Introduction to the episode’s theme and framing
• [04:11–05:18] – Historical criteria for “the right”
• [09:34–11:17] – Umbrella nature of the right and inclusivity
• [12:18–14:10] – Netanyahu’s dominance and the split in the right
• [15:24–17:19] – Profile of Zamir and the issue of judicial appointees
• [19:44–21:34] – Deeper exploration of hadar and its meaning
• [24:39–30:45] – The right’s policy challenges and the morality/security debate
• [33:10–34:21] – Importance of strong, values-based rivalry in politics

---

Tone and Language

The tone is thoughtful, passionate, and at times nostalgic, blending rigorous analysis with personal reflection. Hartman and Halevi balance critical introspection with a yearning for higher standards of public life, dignity in leadership, and the revival of moral and ideological clarity—without losing the “machloket l’shem shemayim” (disagreement for the sake of heaven) spirit that defines the series.

---

For Listeners Who Missed the Episode

This podcast offers a nuanced, insider-outsider look at Israel’s right-wing politics that goes far beyond the headlines, delving into the loss of traditional values, the risks of personality-driven politics, and the urgent need to articulate clear policies and revive a culture of dignified debate. If you are seeking to understand the cultural, ethical, and political dynamics shaping Israel’s future, this episode is essential listening.

Transcript

[Narrator/Host]

You are listening to an art media podcast.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

The right was always much more than just its hard ideology. The right was a cultural argument about what it means to be a Zionist. Jabotinsky defined this in one word, hadar. Hadar means dignity. In its more grandiose, majesty means majesty. Exactly. And when I look at what Netanyahu has done to this Likud, he has destroyed Hadar.

[Daniel Hartman]

When Netanyahu goes to Washington with Trump's pressures, he's aware of them, and he signs a deal to end the war, whether it was exactly what he wanted, he's adapting. But one of the central questions that a Bennett government and a Lieberman government are going to have to answer is, what do you want? What are your plans? What are your goals? And red lines? Hi, friends. This is Danille Hartman and Yossi Klein Halevi from the Sholem Hartman Institute. And this is our podcast, for heaven's sake, in cooperation with ARC Media. Our theme for today, we entitled the state of the Israeli Right. And it's a little. We were a little clever. So we're impressed with ourselves because Israel is the state of the Israeli right in the sense of state as a political entity. And Israel really has moved center, center, right in a very dominant way. Not that the.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

We have literally become the state of the right. Right.

[Daniel Hartman]

It's exactly. We are the state of the political right wing. It's. There's a strong 50% at least, maybe even more than that if we don't include the Israeli Arab, Palestinian parties. So. But 50, 60%, the country has definitely shifted to the right. But we actually want to talk about the state of the Israel right. In the state of Israel, the state, meaning the condition. What's happened to them? Where are they now? I don't know if you ever identified yourself as part of the right wing in Israel. I don't know if that's a place or. It's been such a long time ago for me. It's always been one of the groups, an essential group that I study. And especially as Israel becomes the state of the Israel right, I'll be talking about this more as an outsider. I don't know if you have an insider perspective as well, but we're going to reflect on basically on who is this right. Because understanding them and understanding their challenges is going to determine where Israel is going to go. There might be some form of a national unity government in which there are internal political checks and balances between the right, the center and the left, which we saw in the prior Bennett government. But either way, the Right wing voice is a dominant critical voice. It's very, very different from the voices of world Jewry, in particular North American Jewry, and those who want to understand Israel. We have to delve deep into this state. Now, this is a right wing that's been led by Netanyahu at least 16 years, but in many ways since the mid-90s. So we're talking about 30 years in which he has shaped a major part of it. But we're not going to focus on Netanyahu particularly. We really want to. The three primary pillars of the Israeli right that we want to talk about today are those Israeli right who are not part of the religious Zionist community or the ultra orthodox. We're going to concentrate on the three major parties and their supporters. The supporters of Alikud, the supporters of Bennett's party, I don't know if it has an official name yet. And Israel, our home Yisrael Beiteinu parties. Those are the three dominant, most significant parties.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

Leaving out the Religious Zionist party.

[Daniel Hartman]

That's right, as I said, leaving religious Zionists and also leaving out. There's new figures emerging, but we don't know their weight yet.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

So we're really looking at what once would have been called the mainstream right.

[Daniel Hartman]

The mainstream right. The mainstream right. And there was a spectrum. Lieberman was always on certain issues, a little more to the right. Bennett used to be on the right side of the right and the Likud was right wing and Netanyahu was the far left of the right. So these are the. These parties. So for our audience, let's define if you would have to look at the Israeli right today. Let's try to understand some of their core characteristics. What would you define as. As an essential aspect of it.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

So first of all, you asked me, and I don't know if it was a rhetorical question, but whether I meant see myself as an insider or an outsider to the Israeli right, or saw yourself, or saw myself right. Since moving to Israel, I've never identified with the right ideologically, but I have on occasion voted for the Likud over the years, more than once, depending on circumstance.

[Daniel Hartman]

Could we turn this into a confessional of some form? I'll be your rabbi and do you.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

Want to confess or that's.

[Daniel Hartman]

No, no, you just confessed. I will atone you.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

Oh, I even voted for Netanyahu in the past. There's a real confession, but my political comfort zone was always the center. Sometimes I'll move center right, sometimes center left. Reference point is the center. And how I understand the Israeli Right to date ideologically is very much through the prism of the right. Historically, the Jabotinsky movement was committed to two principles. One was security, which Jabotinsky defined as the Iron Wall Famous essay that he wrote in 1923 that the future Jewish state will need to dissuade the Arab world from attempting to destroy it by building an impenetrable military force. And I think that he's been vindicated in that. And the second foundational principle of the right which applies again today is territorial wholeness, the wholeness of the land of Israel. Now in the pre state period, the Jabotinsky rite was committed to, to what they called both banks of the Jordan, as you know, and I've mentioned that here in the past. I grew up in the Jabotinsky youth movement and I wore a map of not just Greater Israel around my neck, greatest Israel, a silver map. And we all got it from the same jeweler on Ben Yehuda street in Jerusalem. When we would come from New York to visit Israel, that was our stop. And I wore that for years into my twenties. And by that point it was more symbolic than anything else. But it was symbolic of the sense that the whole land belongs to us.

[Daniel Hartman]

Did this have biblical theological significance or not at all? It was just. This was our national inheritance. And you're reclaiming our national inheritance.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

Yeah, you know, I don't remember the biblical narrative coming in strongly. Bethar was a secular nationalist movement with a fair number of religious Jews. I wore a kippah in Beitar and that was considered completely normal. It was the only secular Zionist youth movement that had a significant number of religious kids. And I'm mentioning this because that also tells us something about the cultural flexibility of the right. If you were committed to these two principles, the Iron Wall, impenetrable security and the wholeness of the land, you were on the right. And in those years, again we're speaking about pre state and the early years of the state, religious Zionism was not part of this consensus. B' Nai Akiva the religious Zionist youth movement was socialist and identified more with the socialist secular left wing movements certainly than it did with us. So these two ideas of the wholeness of the land and uncompromising security formed the basis of the right and to this day I would say form the two sensibilities of the right. Now one last point about this, if I could just.

[Daniel Hartman]

There was a point that you had made which you said if it didn't matter if you accepted these two, you were in. And as a result the Likud Party had always had far more religious voters.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

Oh, absolutely.

[Daniel Hartman]

And also the Ashkenazi Sephardi divide, that just wasn't the point. So it enabled them to create a more umbrella and inclusive.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

Absolutely. Which explains the cultural success of the Likud, why it was able to speak to Mizrahim in particular, Jews from Muslim countries who were overwhelmingly traditional. And so there always was this sense on the right of, of we don't care what you are, we don't care what you believe or don't believe. You can be secular, you can be an atheist, you can be religious.

[Daniel Hartman]

Religion, security and land. And I stopped you. And the third point you want and the additional point that you wanted to.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

Make, that these two camps over the years, and you and I have done this as well, we've made a distinction between the security camp and the biblical Land of Israel camp. And the truth is that to some extent that's an artificial distinction because you see in the historical roots of the rite, how these two were completely entwined. And even today, you know, okay, we speak about, for example, the non ideological settlements, you know, that are close to Jerusalem or Tel Aviv, but go out to Maale Adumim, go to Ariel and ask them about their connection to the historic land and they take it as a given. And so I think that what still distinguishes these two camps from each other is a question of priority. And that among the hardcore, which today really is more the religious Zionists, it doesn't matter in the end what the security issues are. Even if settlement were against the security interests of the state, that camp would say, listen, this is our land. And I very much respect that position. It's not mine. I respect it though, because what they're really saying is a people does not walk away from its lines.

[Daniel Hartman]

Your analysis of the Israeli right is, you know, when you speak about Jabotinsky, your whole body, by the way, smiles. Yeah, yeah, there is.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

He's still my hero.

[Daniel Hartman]

There is something very, very deep and also something very decent. It's like I could see your whole childhood upbringing. You both spoke historically, but you were just speaking about where the Israeli right.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

Was very much worse.

[Daniel Hartman]

You're also that. That's a core part. I want to be ideologically, I want to be very, very contemporary. And as I'm watching where the Israeli right is now, and I very much appreciate the two points, but I want to present a different. This is in many ways a dichotomy. Yours wasn't a dichotomy, A dichotomy inherent in Israeli political right wing camp today. The first is the just Netanyahu camp. You can't define Israeli right unless you don't associate it with the personality of Netanyahu. And it's not a cultish thing. It's not like Netanyahu, Right? No, no. It's built maybe on the two principles that you. Or maybe one of them, that Israel's security. It's not the land because he signed y. He'll give up the land in a second. But this is the man that enables me to go to sleep at night and with the confidence that I and my country are going to wake up in the morning.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

Except for one day in his career, everyone's entitled to a mistake. Right?

[Daniel Hartman]

Okay. Again, as in last week. You'll see. I let you get that in. I appreciate that. But that is this core just Netanyahu group. A third of them left him after judicial reform. He goes down, what is it, from 37, he goes to 20, 19, 18, 22. He's beginning to come back after the last ceasefire, he's now up to 25, 26, 27. Depends on which bull. But there's a strong group that says with Netanyahu, our country is safe. He is the person who I'll place my future in his hands. You can't define the right without connecting it to the man who for a generation has led it. The far right very often hated him because he signed territorial compromise deals. And he'll do things that aren't ideological, especially on the area of land. If he believes that Israel's security will be invested in some form of a peace plan with Gulf states, with Saudi Arabia, Iran, he's willing to compromise land for the sake of security. And that makes him in many ways illegitimate for the far. Far right. So one part of the right is the just Netanyahu. But what's been emerging, it really has been emerging since the war and it's beginning more and more powerful, is the non Netanyahu right. Some of them, maybe you could even call them the just not Netanyahu rights. Bennett and Lieberman was the leader of that because he's always had a personal. There's something personal going on there which we don't have to go into right now.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

There is with all of them, with Bennett. I mean, the leaders just not Bibi Wright, were all his closest.

[Daniel Hartman]

Were all his closest rights. And he brought them in until at which point he either betrayed them or he did a move to ensure that he alone was in control. But both Bennett and Lieberman represent a different Right. But I don't want to even focus on them. To clarify this right wing, I actually want to speak about the new chief of staff, this very interesting man who Israeli society doesn't really know. Zamir, we know him a little bit, but he's not running to appear. He doesn't run to speak about himself. He's this, he looks like a tank. You know, Trump called him. You're out of casting central. Like, he looked at him and says, oh my God, you're out of casting central. It's like he's like, he's this solid rock now. This is a man whom all the Likud ministers worked with for years. He was their guy, they loved him, they saw the world similarly. And now when he became chief of staff, they said, okay, life's going to be simple. And then over and over again, he has distanced himself from Netanyahu or the right wing's policy. Whether it was on hostages where he seemed to do a turnaround, whether it was what's the purpose of the war?

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

Or go invading Gaza City.

[Daniel Hartman]

Invading Gaza City. And most significantly on the national inquiry of the war and his fighting with the Minister of Defense. And you see this man, it's like, what happened? What happened when Zamir and people on the Likud are shocked, it's like, where did he come from? He was our guy. What they don't understand is that Zamir is a true right winger of the terms that you mentioned. He doesn't define being on the right as just Netanyahu. He has principles, he has thoughts and he wants to figure out what's best for Israel's security, what's best for Israel's well being. And by the way, the right wing has the same frustration with many of their appointees to the Supreme Court. What happened? Right now, half the people on the Supreme Court, more than but half the people are right wing appointees.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

It's so important and right.

[Daniel Hartman]

These are so, in many ways, all the judicial reform, which was all we need our judges. You have your judges. You've been in power for 16 years. The system created a check and balance between the right and the left.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

But they weren't their judges.

[Daniel Hartman]

No, they were.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

No, they weren't their judges in the sense of being in their back pockets.

[Daniel Hartman]

No, they weren't their judges in the sense of being just Netanyahu people. They actually worry about the rule of law. One member, I forget who it was, who they picked someone who was the first judge, I'm blanking on his name, who lived in A settlement. And they were shocked. How did you have this rule? Well, because I live in a settlement. My whole career has been a commitment to law. Now, because I live in a settlement, which I believe in, does that mean, like law is unimportant? And this just Netanyahu, which is not a just Netanyahu, it's a blind loyalty, independent from principle and issue. And this is the dividing line in.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

The right wing between that's really important.

[Daniel Hartman]

And they don't understand there's a frustration. So Katz and Zamir in many ways are representing this line. What is the goal?

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

Katz is the defense minister.

[Daniel Hartman]

Is the goal that the party. My personal victory, my loyalty to Netanyahu, or is there some ideological right? And so when you look at Israel today and the next election is really about who's going to lead this country, is it going to be the just Netanyahu right, or is it going to be the just not Netanyahu right? Which isn't just in the negative that I'm just like on the left. Anybody but Netanyahu? No, this just not Netanyahu goes back much closer to the ideological roots of what you were speaking about. But given this right wing, they're going to rule. The government is either going to be a Bennett government. I don't see it being a Netanyahu government. It's going to be a Bennett government, but it might be a Bennett. More and more people are now speaking about Bennett Likud government. I don't see a Bennett Netanyahu government, but a Bennett Likud government. What are the challenges facing the right wing today, given the contemporary struggles of Israel, the opportunities, the dilemmas that Israeli society has to face. What do you feel is the most important challenge facing this new Israeli right?

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

Well, it's to deal with the terrible consequences of personalizing the right to such an obsessive extent, where we have a significant bloc of right wing voters who really don't care about the principles and just trust Netanyahu blindly. And the consequences of this are really an erosion of some of the core principles of the right. Not the two that I spoke about, not the commitment to the wholeness of the land and to security. But the right was always much more than just its hard ideology. The right was a cultural argument about what it means to be a Zionist. And Jabotinsky defined this in one word. Hadar. Hadar means dignity in its more grandiose.

[Daniel Hartman]

Majesty.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

Majesty, exactly.

[Daniel Hartman]

It's a beautiful word, by the way.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

It is. And you have to understand the context. Jabotinsky presented this to the Jews of Europe in the 1920s and the 1930s. And he was basically telling them, your survival depends on your being able to adapt a code of military, ethics, of posture. And I remember in Beitar, these were the points that were emphasized, you know, not to be a bent Jew, to be strong, to be self confident, and.

[Daniel Hartman]

To be aware of your rights of Masha Magilah.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

Yes. But deeper than that, it was a code of chivalry. Yes, code of chivalry. So do you know who the hero of Baytar was?

[Daniel Hartman]

I don't know.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

So Shlomo Ben Yosef, in the old right wing parlance, was the first Hebrew. That was the term that the right used for Jews. Hebrew because we wanted the dignity of the ancient Hebrews. The first Jew to be hung by The British in 1938 was Shlomo Ben Yosef. And the morning of his execution, he brushed his teeth. Wow. And this was taught to us, don't be a ghetto Jew. Be a Jew with dignity. And the hymn of Bethar, which to this day I hear it and I get chills involuntarily. It's not my hymn anymore, and yet it shaped me. And Jabotinsky, who wrote the hymn, has a line in there about a Hebrew, even in poverty is a prince. And when I look at what Netanyahu has done to this Likud, he has destroyed Hadar. Now look, hadar is so archaic, you know, at this point.

[Daniel Hartman]

It's a beautiful term.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

It's beautiful. And in the context, you know, it.

[Daniel Hartman]

Has a halachic meeting.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

Say more.

[Daniel Hartman]

There's hidor mitzvah. When you do a mitzvah, you don't. Like you're doing a mitzvah. You don't just do it to get it done with. You should do it to beautify it, to show that it's.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

You're not. You know, you get the most beautiful.

[Daniel Hartman]

Like, that's an example. It's like, he do. Or like, in my sukkah, you come to me like, you could put up a sukkah. You don't knock yourself. Okay, I did a sukkah. Like, God, I did it. What do you guys like? And you can get that feeling sometimes, because if there's 613 commandments, it's exhausting. God, I did it. What else do you want me to do? Okay, but like, when you do hidor, there's a sense of a royalty, of a generosity of spirit, of a largesse, of something bigger that you connect to.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

Exactly. So listen to the horrified reactions of the Old guard of the Likud, Benny Begin. Most of all, Menachem Begin's son, Dan Meridor. That whole generation. What horrified them most of all about Netanyahu was a lack of disposal, dignity, that he was an inveterate liar. To lie was the worst offense in the Jabotinsky movement. It undermined your dignity. Everything was about human dignity and the dignity of a people that had been condemned to death. And Jabotinsky was trying to revive the ghetto Jew.

[Daniel Hartman]

That's Menachem Begin's personality completely.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

And understand this. You look at Begin and what's the difference between Begin and Italian?

[Daniel Hartman]

And what happened after the war in Lebanon?

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

He resigned. I can't. He resigned. I mean, Lo Yaakol, Yotel, he even.

[Daniel Hartman]

Disappears from the public eye. And you look at the difference between Lebanon and October. It's just this whole thing has changed.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

So what we've lost. We haven't lost Hadar, because hadar is a concept that really stopped being relevant as soon as the Holocaust was over and we became a state. But what.

[Daniel Hartman]

Maybe we shouldn't have. There's something. Listen, with Begin, you didn't lose it. With Shamir, these were Hadar people were.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

And Ben Gurion, I think, absorbed something of the ethos of Hadar into what he called mamlachtiyut. Mamlachtiyut is the dignity of the state, that when you represent the state, you uphold its honor. And Ben Gurion's great fear was that the Jews, who had been powerless for 2000 years, wouldn't know how to run a state. And so he tried to invest in this sense that the state itself has value. The apparatus of the state, it's not just functional, it actually has an elevated significance for a formerly stateless people. And what Netanyahu has done is destroy Mamlachtiut. The rule of law, the respect for the rule of law. And this is all so essential. This is where Jabotinsky and Ben Gurion really met. In Mamnakhtiyud. In Mamnakhtiyud.

[Daniel Hartman]

I wanna put in two challenges and get your feedback on them, because as I watch the right wing and I watch them coming closer and closer into power, and these aren't questions that I would put in front of a Netanyahu government, because there, it's the rule of Netanyahu, which is your primer challenge. Your challenge is, how do I maintain this particular constellation? There are two challenges, I think, that are central to how the right wing is going to rule after the next election and the first is not what you're against, but what are you for the right wing, when the left was in power, the left would offer a certain suggestion, the right was against it. When Netanyahu is in power, he'll do A, B or C, and the right will being against it. It's clear what you're against. It's clear you're against stopping the war. Okay, I know you're forced settlements, that may be the only thing, but that's more a religious right. What is it that you want? What is it you want? Like when Netanyahu goes to Washington and he's living in a Trump centric universe with Trump's pressures, he's aware of them, and he signs a deal to end the war, Whether it was exactly what he wanted, he's adapting. Now, whether he's adapting ideologically or he's adapting just to keep himself in power, that doesn't interest me right now. But one of the central questions that a Bennett government and a Lieberman government are going to have to answer is what do you want? What are your plans? What are your goals and red lines? Not in theory when you're talking to yourself, but when you actually have to implement policies in the real world, something that the religious Zionists don't have because they're living in a world of messianic politics. Once you're not a messianist, like Lieberman once said that for, I think it was for true peace, he'll accept a two state solution at one period of time. And when he was the Minister of Defense, you saw that his rhetoric of always being against, he had to start functioning. But I think now what this country needs to know is besides healing the inner divides, where's a right wing government going to take us? What are you willing to do if the Saudis are going to demand some horizon to a Palestinian state? Is there any version of a Palestinian state? What is your version? It might not even be a state. It might be autonomy. I don't know what it is. Is it the Trump peace plan? Area A, B, states C stays in Israel. Is there any flexibility? Not just a list of don'ts. And I think part of what's happened under almost a generation of Netanyahu rule is that the right wing moved away from ideological articulations or policy articulations, basically saying, Netanyahu, you're the person, you decide when the time comes, you will do what needs to be done and we know what we're against. So I think the first step is to ask, besides healing and besides decency, and in addition to your beautiful notion of hadar and state centric thought, what are your policies, not your policies internally, what are your policies externally? And I think the future of the country will depend on the ability of the right wing to articulate some of those policies. And the second one is something that has emerged which for me is one of the deepest challenges and violations of the essence of our Jewishness and the meaning of a Jewish state and of Zionism, is that there's been created a false dichotomy on the right, and it's deep in the current right between morality and security, as if the two. You have to make a choice. Now, when you have to make a choice between security and morality, the only time I know you're supposed to make a choice is in a moment of self defense. But in a moment of self defense, that's not a choice between security and morality. Security is morality, security is morality. And then how we fight, how we engage in war, what we do, what is our ethos. And in many ways, this dichotomy between security and morality is really a dichotomy of the ultra right, ultranationalist. It's not a right wing dichotomy. It never was Netanyahu's. It never was the military people who were very much on the right, Bugiayalon, who used to be on the right, Bugialon, who brought up Elora Zaria, the individual who over a decade ago, 15 years ago, who we spoke about in a prior podcast, who after a terrorist was already injured and assumed dead on the ground, came and saw him moving and shot him without trial. We don't know what's going to come out in Jenin, what the military police just did. There was a sense that I do everything for my security. That wall and this I learned from Grabotinsky too, that the wall, that iron wall, wasn't an immoral wall. It cared very deeply about liberal values.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

Absolutely.

[Daniel Hartman]

And so the right wing, the first challenge is the right wing, what are my policies, what am I willing to do? And how could I lead? Not just how could I say no, no, no, no, no, something that they didn't have to do under Netanyahu because he, whatever he decided would be done. And the second one is to create a wall of separation between right wing nationalists and right wing ultra nationalists. And the fault line is on the distinction or the false distinction between morality and security. And as long as that distinction is there, then morality will be sacrificed all the time, unnecessarily. And there's no culture for us to begin to aspire. You know, part of that hadar that you spoke about was a moral hadar. It was a moral majesty, no question.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

And, you know, the old right, which wasn't that old, you know, we're going back to the period before Netanyahu's legal problems, a period that included Netanyahu's rule as well. And that right actually understood that maintaining Israel's moral credibility is part of security, of our security and of making sure that our friends continued to believe in our moral credibility was essential for maintaining the Iron Wall. And not only wasn't there a contradiction, the two were entwined. And so where I feel the healing needs to happen is before we get to that point, and I agree with you, I agree with you, the Right is, and it actually includes Bennett.

[Daniel Hartman]

Sure.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

But it's especially symptomatic of the Likud, this indifference to defining what you're for. It's always as really, as you put it, what you're against. In order for that transformation to happen, for the Right to begin to take itself seriously again as a responsible political and ideological force, it needs to start doing some very deep healing. And you look at the current Likud, and I have ideological disagreements, deep ideological disagreements with religious Zionism, the religious Zionist Party, but those are ideological disagreements. I respect these people. I can't respect what I see in the Likud today. They're sycophants, etc. They don't speak. They don't speak. Listen to them in the Knesset. It's so embarrassing.

[Daniel Hartman]

You know, it relates to what you said earlier, that if beforehand you joined the Likud or you joined the right, if Israel's security was central and the wholeness of the land was central, and then anybody could join. Now, if you're willing to get on the bandwagon of just Netanyahu, anybody could join.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

That's the measure. Exactly.

[Daniel Hartman]

And then as a result, look who's there. You even, you know, you have Ben Gvir as 20% of the Likud. Forget his voters.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

That's right.

[Daniel Hartman]

Anybody who's willing to play this game of just Netanyahu and anybody who's not are people who disappear. Final reflections for today.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

Yeah. I'll say this as someone who is no longer on the right, but comes from there and has deep love and respect for the traditional right, I need. Israel needs a healthy right wing. And I think that what defines a healthy politics is when you look at your rival camp and you want them to be the best version of themselves because they help keep you honest, they help sharpen your arguments. You want a debate between Menachem Begin and Shimon Peres, Yitzchak Shamir and Yitzhak Rabin. That's what you want, regardless of which side of that debate you're on. So much of what's gone wrong is not just in our politics in America and around the world, is that each side wants the worst side of the other to come out, because then they're easy targets. And you don't have to really engage with their arguments. You just delegitimize them. In order for healing to begin in Israel, we need to have, again, a credible right.

[Daniel Hartman]

There's so many challenges facing Israel, and we're living in a dangerous time where certainties, old things that we thought were predictable and consistent are changing. And we're going to have to adapt. We're going to have to adapt to forces in the world that are going to push us in places that we haven't thought about. We're going to have to confront enemies and potential friends who are new. How do we think about that? If the right wing is going to lead us and if the right wing is going to be able to create a coalition with the left and the center to try to figure out not what divides us, but actually what we could come together and agree on. And I might not get everything. I'm left wing or center left. I'm not going to get everything I want. And I could live with that because I'm not going to get everything I want, because reality's not even going to give it to me, even if I wanted to. But when that conversation happens, not only are we, as you said, are we going to be the best of each other, but we're also going to be able to come together and maybe give our people and our country some path forward. Yossi, it was a pleasure being with you, really.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

Pleasure, Daniel, thank you.

[Podcast Announcer]

Here are some other things that are happening at the Shalom Hartman Institute this week. We invite you to join Pathways to Hope, the Shalom Hartman Institute's newest initiative that empowers us to envision and build a brighter future for Israel. At a time when conversations about Israel have been marked by despair, Pathways to Hope offers an opportunity to learn from Israeli leaders who are embracing today's realities with vision and courage. In December, in select cities around North America, you can meet some of the young Israeli change makers from our Hazon program in Jerusalem. Learn [e-mail] events and keep an eye out for more moments of hope that we will share in the coming weeks and months. Come work with us. We're looking for a Director of Academic Programs, a dynamic, collaborative and mission aligned scholar who can balance intellectual leadership, program design and organizational execution. Check out the link in the show notes for more information about this role and other positions available in North America. Do you read our journal sources in print or online? We want to hear from you. Please complete a brief survey by the end of the year to show our appreciation. One lucky winner will receive a swag bag filled with sources, merch and other fun goodies. Complete the survey at the link in.

[Podcast Promo Voice]

The show notes what if prayer doesn't work? This question strikes us as a distinctly modern one, an outgrowth of the slow disenchantment of the world. But in truth, the question is an old one and one given space to.

[Narrator/Host]

Breathe Here from the Sholom Hartman Institute Thoughts and Prayers is a new podcast that explores what Jewish prayer means and why it still matters. Join host Rabbi Jessica Fisher as she weaves together stories, classic texts and conversations with leading rabbis and thinkers like Yossi Klein.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

Halevi Judaism is about the democratization of the spiritual of Revelation.

[Narrator/Host]

Rabbi Lauren Holtzblatt I was representing the second gentleman Emhoff as his rabbi on that stage.

[Yossi Klein Halevi]

What you had in that moment was.

[Narrator/Host]

The pluralism of America and Rabbi Josh Warshavski.

[Daniel Hartman]

Prayer helps me be the best version of myself. It helps me figure out what do I need in my spiritual backpack.

[Narrator/Host]

Thoughts and prayers inspiring new connections to Jewish prayer in a changing world. Listen now, wherever you get your podcasts.

[Podcast Promo Voice]

For Heaven's Sake is a product of the Shalom Hartman Institute and ARC Media. It is produced by me, Daniel Goodman with help from Miriam Jacobs, Adar Taylor Schechter and Aviva Kat Manore and studio sports support from Go Live Media. Our episode was edited by Seth Stein. Maital Friedman is our Executive producer and our music was composed by Yuval Samoa. Past episodes can be [e-mail] where you can explore more of Arc Media's podcasts. You can watch the video versions of our episodes on our YouTube channel. Follow the YouTube link in the Show Notes. Also, to receive updates on new episodes, please follow the link to arcmedia.org and subscribe to Arc Media's weekly newsletter. For more ideas from the Shalom Hartman Institute, visit our [e-mail].