Transcript
A (0:00)
Dan.
B (0:00)
I'm Dan Kurtzphelin and this is the Foreign affairs interview.
A (0:05)
The idea that the leader is more important than the institutions is the heart and the core of the Netanyahu coup and the policy of this government in the past year.
B (0:19)
A year ago, protests began to rock Israel. For months, hundreds of thousands of demonstrators took to the streets to protest Benjamin Netanyahu's efforts to weaken the country's Supreme Court. Then came Hamas's attack on October 7th, and everything changed. The war has caught Israel at perhaps its most divided moment in history, writes Aloof Ben in a new piece for Foreign Affairs. Ben, the editor of Haaretz, an Israeli newspaper, argues that Netanyahu worked to divide Israeli society with policies that put the country on track for disaster. He spoke to my colleague Justin Vogt on February 27th.
C (1:01)
Hello Alouf. Thank you so much for joining me today.
A (1:04)
Thank you for the invitation to write.
C (1:07)
I want to start our conversation where you start your article in April 1956. That month saw the murder of an Israeli kibbutznik named Roy Rotberg, who was killed by a group of Palestinians while he was patrolling on horseback near the border with the Gaza Strip, which at that time was controlled by Egypt. Now this was a major news story in Israel. The country was shocked and angered by his killing and his funeral was something of a national event. In attendance was the IDF Chief of Staff, Moshe Dayan. Can you tell us a little bit about Dayan? Who was he?
A (1:45)
Dayan was, I would say, created the IDF fighting spirit. He was one of the founders of the military and very early on was very close to David Ben Gurion, the founding father of Israel. And he was the chief of staff in the second half of the 1950s, which saw the buildup of the IDF from its post war of independence and pre state underground days to a regular fighting force. And Dayan was very much the activist. He, he wanted to push Israel towards an aggressive foreign and military policy and security policy. What happened was he was very much endeared by Roy Rodberg. He visited that kibbutz that was established very recently and he came to the kibbutz and he was very much fascinated by the motivation and character of Roy Roetberg. So a couple days later when he found out that this young man was killed, he decided to go to the funeral and deliver a eulogy. That eulogy in many ways has been equated to Israel's Gettysburg Address.
