Here are two texts, almost identical and creepy in equal measure, that were written from a distance of some 90 years from today. The first says, "Newspaper editors must keep out of their newspapers anything that may weaken the power of the Third Reich at home or abroad, the general will of the German nation, the ability to defend Germany, its culture or its economy."
The second states that "aid to the enemy through the media" will be defined as disseminating information intended to "undermine the spirit of Israeli soldiers and citizens in resisting the enemy" or that "serves as a basis for the enemy's propaganda or spokesmen ... or to assist the enemy in his war on Israel, any of its citizens, or Jews."
The first text appears in the Editors Law (Schriftleitergesetz) issued by Nazi Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels in October 1934. The second text comes from the draft emergency regulation proposed by Communications Minister Shlomo Karhiin October 2023, which was revealed by TheMarker's Avi Bar-Eli that month. Karhi has since softened the draconian wording of the proposal, but his determination to implement it has only grown stronger.
In 2016, IDF Deputy Chief of Staff Yair Golan created a storm when he said at a Holocaust Memorial Day ceremony that "if there is something that scares me about the memory of the Holocaust, it is recalling the terrifying processes that took place in Europe in general and in Germany in particular, 70, 80 and 90 years ago, and finding evidence of them here among us today."
Golan was slammed for his remarks and mockingly dubbed the "process identifier." But after eight years, no one any longer needs a magnifying glass to see them. They have matured to become finished products that threaten the remnants of Israeli democracy, which is fighting for its very life, and not as a metaphor.
How else can you interpret the direct threat that Karhi made to the attorney general,Gali Baharav-Miara, in employing the halachic principle of din rodef (killing someone who intends to kill or harm others) when he said, "A person who rises up to kill you – even when done with subterfuge and tacit consent – rise up and fire him"?
Making comparisons to the Nazis' poisonous propaganda machine is always infuriating and stomach-churning. Some would say it misses the mark, even in reference to the lowest moments of the false propaganda of the current Israeli government. There is an ocean that separates it from the Nazi consciousness-engineering apparatus.
After all, "It Can't Happen Here," the title of the 1935 book written by Sinclair Lewis, made a comeback during President Donald Trump's first term. As a convenient and politically correct compromise, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's critics prefer to compare him to more "moderate" fascists, like Viktor Orban or Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
Everyone is, of course, free to choose their preferred fascist to gauge the depth of Israel's democratic deficit and to speculate on when its democracy will become a lifeless corpse. This is perhaps even a comforting and hopeful comparison, since in Israel, as in Turkey and Hungary, and as has already been proven in Poland, the public still can change leaders through elections. But then Karhi arrives, rests his knee on the country's jugular vein and declares, "We are elected, and we can change the regime if we want to."
This is their entire Torah on one leg, a declaration of war on the system of government, which has not been condemned, denied or corrected. It only requires a minor syntactic correction: "We want, and therefore we are already changing the regime."
Karhi, who has proposed abolishing the High Court of Justice, can complete the move and also demand the abolition of elections. Exaggerated? Unfounded? It can't happen here?
"This will always remain one of the best jokes of democracy, that it gave its deadly enemies the means by which it was destroyed," Goebbels once said. I am not comparing him to anyone, God forbid. Just quoting.