H. Scott Prosterman 05/01/2026
Oakland, Ca. (Special to Informed Comment; Feature) – Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu has been empowered by his Likud Party and its coalition partners to behave in a more unhinged way than ever before. The longer he’s been in office, the more he has become an anarchic wrecking ball targeting what’s left of Israeli democracy. Under his reign, the Israeli military has terrorized civilian areas in Lebanon and Iran, while lawless gangs are given free rein in Israel and the Palestinian West Bank to terrorize native Palestinian communities, as the army looks the other way. The aim is to drive Palestinians out of their homes to make room for more illegal Israeli squatter settlements. Demonstrating that he will stop at nothing, Netanyahu has engaged ISIS to help “finish the job” of the genocide in Gaza.
In Israel, selective enforcement of arcane laws is applied to harass Palestinian-Israelis and Palestinians, with the goal of creating unlivable conditions to drive them out of their homes. This is executed with the blessing of US Ambassador Mike Huckabee, who is motivated by Christian Zionist mythology, and apocalyptic designs. That is his justification for denying the human and property rights of native Palestinians. Netanyahu is willfully generating chaos as a policy tool. He freely admits to arming gangs in Gaza to steal humanitarian aid, and destroy Palestinian businesses there. His self-righteous justification is that this “saves the lives of Israeli soldiers,” whom he has put in the line of fire.
By selecting extremists such as Jewish Power figure Itamar Ben-Gvir and Religious Zionism leader Bezalel Smotrich as cabinet ministers, Bibi has embraced and legitimized Israeli “Proud Boy Culture.” He co-opted two monstrous men, one with a heinous criminal record for hate crimes and the other with a history of detentions, so he could form a government. That move signaled that all bets are now off as far as Israeli democracy is concerned. Israel is allowing far-right West Bank settlers to do the dirty work of the Israeli military while its troops stand and watch.
Israeli authorities have allowed, and tacitly encouraged ultra-Orthodox enclaves to create their own autonomy “devoid of law and order.” former Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman pointed to these actions, carried out without the approval of the Cabinet, as examples of Israel’s disintegrating democracy. Referring to the gangs the Netanyahu cabinet is backing in Gaza, he told Kan Bet Public Radio, “The Israeli government is giving weapons to a group of criminals and felons, identified with Islamic State, at the direction of the prime minister.” Perversely, Bibi armed ISIS gangs to further the ethnic cleansing and expanded Israeli occupation, by creating a power vacuum of lawlessness.
The Likud Party has become an Orwellian Big Brother in Israel. In my experience, one of the true charms of Israel is the ageless, polyglot of ancient and modern cultures, and seeing signage in Hebrew, English and Arabic for government and private businesses. Recently, an Arab-owned restaurant in Haifa was ordered to remove their Arabic language sign, under an arcane municipal law, which is selectively enforced to harass and torment Palestinian business owners. The order was executed in the most brutal and nerve-wracking manner possible, clearly intended to intimidate and demoralize.
In February mass Palestinian protests erupted over the escalation of civilian deaths in Israel and the West Bank at the hands of far-right settlers and organized criminal gangs. Since the start of 2026, 36 Palestinians have been killed within Israel in the crime surge, after 252 were killed in 218 incidents in 2025 under Ben-Gvir’s willful negligence as head of domestic national security. Attorney Ahmed Khalifa argues, “This deliberate negligence is a policy aimed at internally dismantling the community and forcing it to prioritise the basic demand of safety.”
Netanyahu has done more to inspire antisemitism than any Jew in history, giving Israel a bad name worldwide for the genocide in Gaza and pogroms in the West Bank. While it is grossly unfair to blame ordinary Jews for these atrocities, Netanyahu’s constant proclamation that Israel represents Jews confuses the public. Zionism began as a secular, agrarian movement in the late 19th century. It began with no mention of the fulfillment of any “Biblical prophecy.” While secular political movements, whatever their flaws, can strike political compromises, messianic ones view the world as black and white, heightening polarization and insisting on maximal goals.
Jewish “exceptionalism” has always been a factor; writer-humorist Steve Bhaerman (aka Swami Beyondananda) once told me, “Jewish exceptionalism also means that Jews make exceptional victims and exude exceptional victimhood.” Netanyahu has taken this exceptionalism concept to a self-serving, destructive extreme for Jews worldwide. Under his leadership the Likud mindset has been to punish Palestinians for the sins of European fascism, in a gross display of misplaced and displaced anger.
More recently, Israeli President Chiam Herzog has sent mixed signals about Netanyahu’s campaign to be pardoned for his 2019 indictments for bribery, breach of trust and fraud. Since then he has used every tactic available to delay his judgment and likely conviction. Netanyahu’s legal team requested a pardon for their client to escape accountability, claiming that his court appearance obligations distract him from governing the country, and that a pardon serves the public interest. Obviously, this move serves the prime minister’s interest rather than the public good, but Netanyahu’s egocentric myopia blurs all that. Herzog has not granted a pardon, but has initiated a plea bargain process to postpone or avoid having to pardon him, under pressure from Likud ministers. But it’s unprecedented for a president to pardon a convict or indicted subject in the middle of a trial.
Netanyahu has been on trial since 2019 for three separate cases, which now have byzantine legal complexities. Case 4000 alleges that Netanyahu directed regulatory decisions to the benefit of Shaul Elovitch, in return for favorable news coverage from the Walla news site, owned by Elovitch’s Bezeq telecom company. Case 2000 charges Bibi with arranging a quid-pro-quo deal with Yedioth Ahronoth publisher Arnon Mozes, while Case 1000 is a breach of trust complaint motivated by the merger proposal of the Keshet and Reshet television networks, owned by billionaire Arnon Milchan.
File photo. State Department. Benjamin Netanyahu. Public Domain. Via Picryl .
But once again, this week’s scheduled trial has been postponed with his attorney’s arguing that his security obligations as prime minister take precedence over the oft-postponed legal proceedings. The alleged “emergency” for the most recent delay is so he can monitor the aid flotilla sent to Gaza from Barcelona. On Wednesday, Netanyahu ordered the Israeli armed forces to commit a clear violation of international law, kidnapping 211 activists from the flotilla as it plied international waters far from Israel.
In essence, Israel is ruled by a lawless prime minister, who promotes lawlessness by germinating and manipulating continual chaos that serves to further delay his judgment for his criminal indictments, while promoting lawlessness in Israeli society to sow more chaos and violence aimed at Palestinians and his Israeli opposition.