'Populism' and the Zionist left – part 1

Millionaire former telecoms chief executive Avi Gabbay has become the new leader of the Israeli Labor party. For some on the pro-Israel right in the UK’s Labour Party, Gabbay has been hailed as the great new hope for the Israeli Labor party, or “the Israeli Macron,” as both the director of Labour Friends of Israel and the Guardian have put it.

Gabbay and France’s new President Emmanuel Macron share certain similarities. Both are political outsiders thrust into the public spotlight only recently.

Despite never being elected to a seat in Israel’s parliament, Gabbay joined Labor only last year, having defected from a smaller right-wing party. He once served as a minister in a previous government of hard-right Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Macron left the French Socialist Party and has now formed his own “centrist” pro-business party.

Like Gabbay, Macron too came over from the business world, being a former investment banker. Gabby reportedly raked in more than $14 million during his 14 years at Bezeq, the Israeli telecoms giant.

Both have fed on a certain popular disgust in their respective countries with established politicians, to come from outside the political establishment in a sudden and unexpected manner. This global phenomenon, often dismissively (and usually inaccurately) called “popularism” has led in multiple different directions.

In the US election, a low turnout, combined with a widely despised and shockingly bad Democratic party candidate in the form of Hillary Clinton led this anti-politics in a right-wing direction, leading to the election of Donald Trump. The Democrats’ base did not turn out to vote or to canvass in sufficient numbers to secure a win, simply because Clinton’s record – on both domestic and international affairs – is so extremely hard-right that she could excite few except her devoted groupies in the establishment liberal media.

Trump on the other hand did excite his base – which in large part was composed of ageing racists, the “alt-right”, white nationalists, and even, in some cases, outright neo-Nazis.

But this narrow base of support is not enough to explain his electoral win: the wider anger and disillusionment that Trump was able to exploit has deeper roots – roots grown over decades by the neoliberal establishment that Clinton is the very apogee of.

Trump, then, was able to exploit this crack in order to capture the Whitehouse, in what he probably saw mostly as a new business venture. And instead of having some self-reflection, and finding a way to (for example) bring free universal healthcare to the people of the US, the Democrats are now indulging in delusional conspiracy theories about Russia.

Macron too was able to exploit this disillusionment and leap into the a fissure. That his nearest opponent was Marine Le Pen – of the historically fascist Front National – helped. The division of the French left helped too: leading leftist candidate Jean-Luc Mélenchon came agonisingly close to reaching the second round, where he could have given Macron a serious run for his money.

If only Benoît Hamon  had done the right thing and stepped down. He was the candidate of the now utterly failed establishment Socialist Party – a once-ruling party now humiliated into fifth place behind both the fascists and Macron – the French Tony Blair. If even half of Hamon’s voters had gone for Mélenchon, the latter would have smashed Le Pen into a distant third place, leaving her well out of the second round. With the increased voter turnout this development would have brought, it’s likely Mélenchon would have been the president right now.

With Mélenchon knocked out in the second round – despite all the liberal media hype about the supposed popularity of Macron – the abstention rate was an astonishing 25 per cent, with as many as four million blank and spoiled ballots on top of that.

Only three months after entering office, Macron’s ratings have plummeted, with his approval numbers already into negative territory. With Macron reportedly likening himself and his style of governance to the Roman god Jupiter, it’s little wonder. Both Trump and Macron share the arrogance of power, wealth and privilege: considering politics to be something best done by “enlightened” elites. Trump’s appeal to the working masses is of course pure hogwash at best, and cynical manipulation of racist currents at worst (as it often is).

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.