The Impact of Operation Protective Edge on Political and Social Trends in Israel

By: Meir Elran, Yehuda Ben Meir, and Gilead Sher

In late 2014, the Israeli domestic picture changed dramatically as a result of the disbanding of Benjamin Netanyahu's coalition government and the Knesset's decision to dissolve itself and hold general elections on March 17, 2015. Early elections prior to the conclusion of the Knesset's legal term in office is nothing new in Israel and is actually typical of the past two decades. The forthcoming early elections, however, constitute a particularly unusual phenomenon on the Israeli political landscape, as the dissolution of the Knesset after less than two years in office (the 19th Knesset was supposed to remain in office for four and a half years, until the fall of 2017) demonstrates an increasingly serious problem of governance that calls Israel’s political stability into question. According to all the polls and surveys, the majority of the Israeli public opposed the disbanding of the government and the call for new elections, particularly due to the slim chances of an improvement in the basis of governance in the next Knesset as well, regardless of the outcome of the elections.  

The results of the March 17, 2015 elections will be influenced by many factors that are security-related, economic, social, and political in nature. At the time of this writing, mid-January 2015, the Israeli public can expect an election campaign filled with vicissitudes and reversals whose outcome is difficult to forecast. In any case, however, the nature of Israel's political and social system in 2015 and beyond will, to a great extent, be determined by the structure of the next Knesset, the government it establishes, and its leaders – all of which are currently unknown.

The announcement of early elections has distracted attention from the impact of Operation Protective Edge on the Israeli political and social arena. Nonetheless, this operation remains the one major event in 2014 that almost all citizens in Israel experienced on a first-hand level. For this reason, the impact of the operation and its related phenomena on Israeli society is important to consider. There are a number of reasons to suggest that Operation Protective Edge will have a more decisive impact on Israeli public consciousness than Israel's previous clashes with Hamas. The firs reason is the operation's relatively extended duration: 50 days, which is longer than all of Israel's previous military clashes (with the exception of the first and second intifadas), including the Second Lebanon War (which lasted 33 days). The meaning of this troubling fact, which has been lost on neither the Israeli public nor the media, is that despite Israel’s military power and the massive damage inflicted by its attacks on Hamas in the Gaza Strip, the IDF was forced to mount a significant campaign, albeit not without elements of self-restraint, for more than seven weeks before Hamas agreed to a ceasefire according to terms dictated by Egypt (which was already proposed after seven days of fighting). In the debate regarding who defeated whom in this last round of fighting, the duration of the clash can be understood in one way only: as an element favoring Hamas, and as such, as an element detracting from the IDF or the Israeli government.

The war's duration and its resulting perception by many as a "strategic draw" appears to be the cause of the visible sense of discomfort that has pervaded the Israeli public with regard to the results of the military operation, despite the considerable efforts made by the Israeli Prime Minister and Defense Minister (not necessarily with the entire government’s endorsement) to portray the campaign as a distinctive success. During the operation itself and undoubtedly during its later stages – alongside the fierce political debate that accompanied it – the public appeared confused regarding the aim of the campaign and the significance and implications of its various stages. This gap between the perception of the Israeli public and the picture painted by the senior political and military echelons regarding the purpose and outcome of the war may have had had a detrimental impact, even if only temporary, on the image of the senior IDF commanders, who continue to portray it as a major success.

Another factor that has influenced Israeli public opinion regarding the significance of Operation Protective Edge is the overall context of the Palestinian issue. Although in military terms the operation was limited to the Gaza Strip, it occurred against a background of negative developments in Israeli-Palestinian relations and troubling events in the West Bank. These include the failure of US Secretary of State John Kerry to advance the political process between Israel and the Palestinian Authority; the abduction and murder of three Jewish teenagers by a Hamas cell in the Gush Etzion area and Operation Brother's Keeper, the extensive campaign conducted by the IDF against the Hamas infrastructure in the West Bank in the wake of the event (an occurrence that in retrospect proved to be a stage in the escalation that culminated in the confrontation between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip); the murder of a Palestinian teenager in Jerusalem by Jewish extremists; and increased security tension in Jerusalem and its environs during and following the operation. Joining these developments were manifestations of racism among certain members of the Jewish public.

Public Opinion regarding Operation Protective Edge

The many fluctuations in Israeli public opinion during Operation Protective Edge were reminiscent of the vicissitudes in public opinion that characterized the Second Lebanon War. Both were cases of military operations that were relatively extended in duration and that ultimately lasted longer than the Israeli public anticipated at their outset. In both cases, the home front constituted the primary front line. During the first days of the Second Lebanon War, the decision to go to war was supported by approximately 90 percent of the Jewish public, and Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's public approval ratings reached 82 percent. By the end of the war, however, just one month later, the Prime Minister was forced under public pressure to establish a commission of inquiry to investigate the war and its failures. According to a survey conducted by the National Security and Public Opinion Project of the Institute for National Security Studies (INSS) in March 2007 (approximately nine months after the end of the war), only 23 percent of Israel's Jewish population believed that Israel had won the war, as opposed to 26 percent who believed that Hizbollah had been victorious and 51 percent who believed that neither side had won.

In the case of Operation Protective Edge, the picture is not as extreme. Still, here too public opinion appears like a roller coaster. During the first stages of the campaign, especially following the discovery of the underground tunnels dug by Hamas under the border with the Gaza Strip and the incursion of IDF ground forces, the operation enjoyed the wall-to-wall support of the Jewish public. In a survey conducted by Israel's Channel 2 on July 17, 2014, some ten days after the beginning of the operation and one day prior to the IDF's ground invasion of the Gaza Strip, 57 percent of the Jewish public rated the Prime Minister's handling of the situation as "good," as opposed to 35 percent who described it as "not good." According to a survey broadcast on Israel's Channel 2 one week later on July 24, the public perception of the Prime Minister's handling of the situation had improved dramatically, with 82 percent of respondents characterizing it as "good" and only 10 percent as “not good.” From that point on, the longer the fighting lasted and the more ceasefires were declared and subsequently violated by Hamas, the more the Prime Minister's public approval ratings declined.

By the end of the operation, the Prime Minister had lost the support of much – and according to some surveys, a majority – of the Israeli public. A survey broadcast on Channel 2 on August 25, 2014, one day before the operation's conclusion, revealed a dramatic decline in the public's assessment of the Prime Minister's performance, with only 38 percent characterizing it as good and 50 percent characterizing it as not good. Two days later, and one day following the end of the fighting, a survey conducted by Channel 2 reflected an additional decline, with 32 percent ranking his performance as good and 59 percent ranking it as not good. Although a survey published in Haaretz on August 28 indicated that 50 percent of the public was satisfied by the Prime Minister's performance, this percentage was still a far cry from his approval ratings during the initial days and weeks of the operation. Presumably these results reflected large portions of the Israeli public's prevalent dissatisfaction at the time regarding the outcome of the war, which analysts were then referring to as "a sense of missed opportunity."

A similar picture emerges with regard to the public's assessment of the outcome of the war. In a survey conducted for INSS by Rafi Smith on July 27-28, 2014, in the midst of the Israeli ground operation, 71 percent of the country's Jewish population expressed the view that Israel was winning the war, as opposed to 6 percent which believed that Hamas was winning, and 23 percent that maintained that neither side was winning and that it was thus far "a draw." However, in a similar survey conducted on August 6, after the withdrawal of IDF forces from the Gaza Strip, only 51 percent expressed the view that Israel had won the war, whereas 4 percent indicated that Hamas had won, and 45 percent said that no one had won. After the conclusion of the operation, levels of public dissatisfaction with the outcome of the war reached new heights. In a survey broadcast by Channel 2 on August 27, 2014, the day after the end of the operation, only 29 percent answered affirmatively whether they believed that Israel had won the war, as opposed to 59 percent who responded negatively. A survey published the following day in Haaretz reflected almost identical findings. In response to the question "How would you define the outcome of the war," only 26 percent indicated that Israel had won, whereas 16 percent indicated that Hamas had won and 54 percent maintained that no one had won.

The Political Implications

The above data reflects the vicissitudes of Israeli public opinion as it evolved during Operation Protective Edge. However, the more interesting question has to do with the impact of the war and the public perception of its significance in the long term. Is this the beginning of a genuine shift in the views of the public on the left-right, dove-hawk spectrum? Can we speak of a fundamental change in the public's views regarding a possible settlement with the Palestinians in general and the future of Judea and Samaria in particular? And if such a shift has indeed begun, is it only temporary, reflecting primarily an immediate and largely emotional response to the war, or are there new insights among the Israeli public with long term implications?

These questions are difficult to answer given the short time that has elapsed and hence the limited perspective since the conclusion of the war, and therefore the future direction of public opinion regarding these issues is uncertain. Moreover, trends in public opinion are also heavily influenced by other issues, particularly with the dissipating impact of the operation over time. For this reason, at this point any analysis of such questions is necessarily based on conjecture, although the results of the March 17 elections are likely to provide answers to these questions, at least to some extent. Moreover, even if this shift continues for an extended period of time, it may be reversible and subject to the influence of events and constraints that will emerge in the future.

Nonetheless, as it currently stands, there are definite signs indicating that a rightward shift has indeed begun in the views of the Israeli public, particularly with regard to the Arabs within Israel proper and some aspects of a possible settlement with the Palestinians. The primary and strongest indications of a a rightward shift in Israeli public opinion are the findings of surveys published between the end of Operation Protective Edge (in late August 2014) and the decision (in early December 2014) to hold early elections regarding the voting intentions of the public. The current Knesset is characterized by a plurality between a right wing-religious bloc (with 61 mandates) and a center-left bloc (with 59 mandates). These surveys indicated that if the elections were held during this interim period, the right wing-religious bloc would have received 70-75 mandates, reflecting an unprecedented achievement. Since the beginning of the election campaign, however, the picture has changed somewhat, and at the time of this writing the gap between the two blocs has shrunk.

Explanations for the rightward shift in Israeli public opinion are not difficult to find. The argument voiced by spokespeople of the Israeli right (and not just the extreme right wing) – that in practice it is impossible to ensure Israeli security without a permanent presence throughout Judea and Samaria, if only in the realm of security – was to a certain extent reinforced by the outcome of Operation Protective Edge. Although Prime Minister Netanyahu does not advocate this specific position, he has on various occasions emphasized that the security arrangements, which he regards as essential for agreeing to the establishment of a Palestinian state, include not only an IDF presence along the Jordan River but the IDF's freedom to operate throughout the West Bank. Hamas' ability to launch rockets deep into Israel, the severe psychological impact of the tunnels dug beneath the border of the Gaza Strip, and the temporary closure of the "gateway to the country" – the Ben Gurion airport – that resulted from Hamas rocket fire appears to have left a major impression on the Israeli public. All

this must also be considered in conjunction with significant developments in the Arab world, including the dissolution of some Arab states, the rise of radical political Islam, the threats posed by the Islamic State organization (ISIS), and the continuing threat of Hizbollah in the north. Each component of this web of threats has a direct impact on Israeli public consciousness, which shapes the Jewish population's attitudes on security and political issues and, to a certain extent, fundamental questions in the domestic arena, including its relationship with the country's Arab minority.

Only in early May 2015, when there emerges a clear understanding of the results of the March 17 elections, including the composition of the new government and the identity of the new prime minister, will it be possible to assess more accurately Israel's future orientation with regard to these weighty questions.

The Social Situation: Jewish-Arab Relations in Israel

Inevitably, there is a connection between the views of the Jewish public in Israel regarding political and security-related issues on the one hand, and its attitude toward the country's Arab minority on the other. This linkage found distinctly negative expression during the past year when serious security-related events in Israel and abroad, such as acts of terrorism and military confrontations (most notably Operation Protective Edge), provided a backdrop for severe manifestations of radicalization, violence, and racism on the part of Jews against the Arab minority, including within institutionalized political discourse. Yet while 2014 witnessed definite radicalization in Jewish-Arab relations, it is not at all certain whether this is a sustainable trend that is expected to intensify, or whether both sides will find ways to curb these serious, threatening developments and maintain at least a tolerable level of coexistence.

Israeli consciousness in the context of attitudes toward the Arabs is shaped by other significant factors beyond security events. One of these is political discourse, which, even before the upcoming elections were announced, has dealt increasingly with questions regarding the national identity of the State of Israel. This trend has been the outcome of efforts by the government and some of its right wing elements to instigate fundamental and, at times, radicalized debate over the differences between Israel as the nation state of the Jewish people and Israel as a democracy. The Democracy Index for 2014 (compiled by the Israeli Democracy Institute in March and April 2014), which relates primarily to the socioeconomic situation in the country, reflects a clear picture on this key issue. When asked to choose between a Jewish state and a democratic state, 39 percent (a large majority of whom were presumably Jews) indicated that the state's Jewish character was more important than its democratic character; 33 percent chose the latter. In a broader context, approximately 33 percent of Jewish respondents and 50 percent of Arab respondents stated that Israel is less democratic today than it was in the past. And on a more concrete level, whereas 63 percent of the Jews interviewed opposed discrimination against Israel's Arab population, a sweeping majority (74 percent) maintained that critical decisions on issues of peace and security must be based on a Jewish majority, indicating a desire for the clear political exclusion of Arabs from one of Israel's two major issues of debate (the second of which is the socioeconomic issue).

In its assessment of Israeli society in 2013, the Democracy Index found Jewish-Arab tension to be the strongest source of tension in Israeli society (69 percent), surpassing the tensions between rich and poor, religious and secular, left and right, and Mizrahi and Ashkenazi. It also found that approximately half of those questioned believed that Jews should possess more rights in Israel than its Arab citizens. At the time, approximately 44 percent of respondents believed that the Israeli government should encourage the emigration of Arabs.

It is therefore no surprise that this combination of an intensifying nationalist background, the prevailing political tension and unstable government, and the severe tensions existing in the security realm has produced a foundation conducive to discourse that nourishes hostility, alienation, and social and political exclusion and that, albeit inadvertently, encourages racism and violence. These phenomena have gained momentum in the at times unruly discourse in the social media, which provides a platform for derision and verbal violence. In addition to the unofficial members of the Jewish and Arab population who have participated in this discourse, individuals from within the political establishment have also taken advantage of the dark public mood by inciting against Arabs for political gain. The radicalization in Jewish-Arab discourse observed in the past year has overshadowed the prospects for reasonable coexistence between the two communities. The phenomenon has posed a threat not only to public order but also to the delicate fabric of Jewish-Arab relations in Israel. Consider the statement by Israeli Supreme Court Justice Salim Jubran:

I could spend hours or even whole days speaking about equality, but I want to quote from the Declaration of Independence, and you judge. The Declaration of Independence speaks specifically about equality, and unfortunately it’s not happening in the field. A sentence from the Or Commission report sums it up: “The state’s Arab citizens live in a reality of being discriminated against.”

Also relevant to the discussion are developments in the Arab sector in Israel. According to data produced by a special survey conducted by the StatNet research institute in November 2014, around the time of the onset of the severe incidents between Arabs and Jews following Operation Protective Edge and the terrorist attacks in Jerusalem, 36 percent of the Muslims in Israel regard themselves as Palestinians, 31 percent as neither Palestinian nor Arabs, 25 percent as Israelis, and 8 percent as Palestinian Israelis. Additional data reflects that 77 percent of those Arabs questioned would prefer to live in Israel (the remainder, 27 percent of the Muslims surveyed expressed their preference to live in a Palestinian state). Only 9 percent of the Arabs questioned expressed the belief that the Israeli establishment does not discriminate against them, whereas 42 percent of the Muslims questioned regard themselves as victims of discrimination by state institutions. What appears to be emerging is a pluralistic picture reflecting broad diversity throughout the Arab population – a picture that differs from Jewish public's perception of the situation, based on the typically nationalist statements made by Arab politicians in the Knesset.

Also relevant in this context is the issue of Arab representation in the Knesset in the wake of the decision to raise the electoral threshold in general elections to 3.25 percent. There is an element of irony in the fact that this decision has motivated the Arab parties to submit a united list for the upcoming elections, even though it is still unclear how they will operate in their aftermath. In any event, many Arab voters will presumably view the upcoming elections as a moment of political opportunity and transform the protest against social exclusion and alienation into an incentive for political participation. Maintaining unity will enable them to realize their electoral power and become a significant parliamentary force.

Despite the radicalization of both camps, the Jewish and Arab publics in Israel contain strong forces capable of stopping the deterioration in their mutual relations. The Jewish camp is in need of restraint and responsibility based on a deep understanding of the volatility of the situation and the serious dangers posed by incitement against the Arabs. This is the background to the actions of Israeli President Reuven Rivlin, who has been laboring to generate a different, positive and constructive discourse on this complex and challenging issue. However, as in the case of related issues (such as the provocative visits to the Temple Mount by Jewish activists and politicians affiliated with the Israeli right wing), some are trying to gain political capital from the Jewish-Arab tensions in ways that are tantamount to playing with fire.. Although the Arab camp also contains provocative elements attempting to gain political and public capital from the actual hardships and legitimate grievances of the Arab, the Arabs in Israel have repeatedly proven their awareness of the need for restraint and moderation and have conducted themselves accordingly, in order to promote coexistence with the Jewish majority, which they see as in their own best interests. In this sense, the past year has been no exception. In most cases, the broader Arab public has neither been provoked nor taken part in disturbances or demonstrations, most of which have been restrained and have not escalated to the national level. Following the elections, the most important task of the united Arab leadership will be to maintain and reinforce this approach.   

The Jewish Public: Heightened Polarization, Violence, and Radicalization

In the course of the extensive search for the three teenagers kidnapped in the Gush Etzion area (Operation Brother's Keeper), a sense of solidarity emerged within the Jewish public. Knesset members from the right wing and the left wing visited the family members of the abducted youths, and tens of thousands throughout the country prayed for their safe return. Below the surface, however, were murky, racist currents that erupted following the discovery of the youths' bodies and tainted the picture of national solidarity. These included calls for revenge that gained considerable momentum in the social media, and racist postings against Arabs that also contained inciting and derogatory remarks against voters of the Israeli left who were frequently portrayed as traitors to the state. This trend intensified after the launching of Operation Protective Edge. The discourse on the social media grew increasingly violent, and posts that questioned the necessity of the military force being used by Israel in the Gaza Strip or expressed empathy for the suffering of Gaza population were frequently met with curses and explicit threats.  

The violent discourse and intense disagreements quickly expanded beyond the limits of the social media and entered the public arena. Approximately forty days into the fighting in the Gaza Strip, left wing activists organized a demonstration in Tel Aviv's Habima Square to protest the Israeli military campaign. In response, a group of right wing activists, including members of the "Kahana Lives" movement, organized a counter-demonstration. During the demonstration, right wing activists attacked and injured some participants in the left wing protest. These events illustrated that the unity of the Jewish public following the abduction of the Jewish teens was, to some extent, limited, and that the Jewish public has the potential for serious political escalation and violence. Here too the discourse in the social media was the most extreme, but intolerance was also manifested in the current affairs programs in the Israeli media. Moreover, the violence of a handful of extremist right wing groups against left wing demonstrations was dealt with in a lenient manner. For example, public employees who posted statuses of a violent and or excluding nature on the internet suffered no consequences, which implies the condoning of incitement on the pretext of freedom of expression. When the expression of a view that appears to oppose the view of the majority is met with violence and threats of murder, the time has come for the official leadership and law enforcement agencies to act with greater determination.

Israeli Social Resilience

The typically dormant media and political discourse regarding national resilience tends to rise to the surface when the civilian front finds itself under the attack of missile and rocket fire. This is what happened in the past year in the context of Operation Protective Edge and related events.

Unlike the standard discourse that relates to resilience as the ability of the Israeli public to withstand hardships, resilience in its professional and academic sense refers to the capacity of a system as a whole to weather severe disruption of any kind caused by any force, external or internal, human or natural; to respond to it according to its intensity, especially its actual or perceived damage, typically through a reduction in functioning in specific areas; and to recover from the disruption and from the reduction in performance as quickly as possible. A highly resilient system is one that proves its capacity for rapid recovery and for the quick resumption of full or even improved functioning.

In this instance, as in previous rounds of hostilities with Hamas in the Gaza Strip, the Israeli public displayed an overall high level of social resilience, manifested in measured responses to the rockets fired on population centers and the rapid return to routine after each event. In most cases the challenge posed to Israel was minor in terms of the number of rockets fired by Hamas, the warheads they bore, and their accuracy, and the result was an extremely low level of overall casualties and property damage. For this reason, the lessons learned from the behavior of the Israeli public during Operation Protective Edge are not necessarily indicative of the public's conduct in a future confrontation, especially with Hizbollah. As Hizbollah's rocket and missile capabilities are significantly greater than those possessed by Hamas, the damage sustained during a clash with this group can be expected to be much more severe than a confrontation with Hamas and challenge the population's social resilience accordingly. This assessment requires the formulation of an appropriate response that is not only offensive and preventative in nature, but one of defense – not only of population centers but also of IDF bases and critical national infrastructure, which for the most part lacks sufficient protection against both serious high trajectory threats and the substantial threat of cyber attack. This will require a detailed all-encompassing national plan for defense (including reasonable physical protection) and the promotion of social and infrastructural resilience.

The social resilience of the Israeli public is a function of the intensity of the physical and psychological disruption sustained. The extent of damage caused by the campaign against Hamas differed in accordance with the range of the rockets fired (60 percent of the rockets were fired at a range of 20 kilometers, 32 percent at ranges up to 40 kilometers, and only 8 percent at longer ranges), and the threat of the attack tunnels was present only in the immediate proximity to the border with the Gaza Strip. The level of social resilience also differed by area. The settlements of the Gaza periphery displayed a different level of resilience against a challenge that differed in essence, immediacy, and intensity to that faced by the inhabitants of more distant areas. The inhabitants of areas in close proximity to the border displayed a high level of resilience, which was initially expressed primarily in reduced performance, mainly due to the self-evacuation of many thousands of inhabitants, but was also manifested in the population's extremely quick return to their homes and resumption of their normal lives following the conclusion of the hostilities.

Nonetheless, and although the government decided to pay the residents of the Gaza perimeter and the Negev (particularly the western Negev) high compensation for the damages caused by the campaign and its effects, this region is currently characterized by a pervasive sense of disappointment with the scope of the preparations for future clashes. The withdrawal of IDF soldiers from routine defensive security responsibilities within the settlements in the region has also met with an angry response. Overall, a sense of security-related, political, and economic alienation is evident in the communities located in the region adjacent to the Gaza Strip, and charges are heard of a lack of understanding of the special needs of the inhabitants of the region, neglect of the periphery, preferential treatment of the Israeli settlements in the West Bank, and the lack of political initiative in search of a long term solution for the threat emanating from Gaza. These feelings do not help strengthen the social resilience of the local inhabitants in preparation for the next round of fighting, especially as a broad state-sponsored effort has yet to be advanced to strengthen the social resilience of the communities of southern Israel in general.

Conclusion

This essay has considered the factors that influenced the sociopolitical atmosphere reflected in the Israeli public in the course 2014. Focusing on aspects of external and internal security, it has reviewed three sources of tension stemming from Israel's external challenges and internal tensions: the growing division between Jews and Arabs that threatens public stability and order; the radicalization and escalation of relations between the political extremes in Jewish society; and the gap between the center and the periphery reflected over the past year during Israel's confrontation with Hamas. Any such list would certainly be incomplete if it failed to mention the additional dimensions of division and alienation that frequently arise in absence of comprehensive solutions on the political, social, and economic levels. All these elements have a direct impact on national security due to their connection with Israeli society's ability to mobilize itself in preparation for and during future external and internal tests. Meeting these challenges will require a clear understanding that the debate over the future character of the State of Israel, which is currently being conducted with full intensity in advance of the Knesset elections, is not one ranging between distinct, independent internal social issues on the one hand, and external security issues on the other hand, and that these two spheres are actually mutually intertwined. In other words, without internal social strength and inter-personal tolerance, the State of Israel will suffer in the realm of security and will lack the essential foundation necessary to build a prosperous economy and a thriving society.

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