Melanie Phillips writes about what’s going on in Israel with Ehud Barak
Wow:
Unfortunately, there can surely be no compromise with the organizers of the anti-reform protests, because for them the real issue was never the reform itself. As was stated explicitly from the start by former Prime Minister Yair Lapid and others, the aim was to bring down Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government.
One of the main leaders of the protests is another former prime minister, Ehud Barak. An astounding video clip has now surfaced showing Barak in March 2020 addressing Forum 555, a group of retired Israeli Air Force pilots and navigators.
Three years before judicial reform was even a twinkle in the Israeli government’s eye, Barak detailed for this group a plan for a coup d’état that would overturn the Netanyahu government and install Barak himself as prime minister.
The plan involved inciting the civilian population to revolt by falsely claiming that Israel’s democracy was in danger and bankrolling protests that would manipulate popular patriotism by such measures as the mass purchase of Israeli flags.
Such an uprising, said Barak, had to be presented to the public as a defense of democracy rather than an attempt to get rid of Netanyahu. “Democracy is a better dividing line,” he said. “Support for democracy penetrates deep into the right as well.”
He went on, “I have a friend who is a historian and who once told me: ‘Ehud, they will call on you [to lead] when dead bodies float in the Yarkon River.’ But I wish to emphasize that the bodies will not be those of workers who infiltrated from the ‘territories,’ nor those of Israeli Arabs. The bodies that float will be those of Jews killed by Jews.” …
… So, Barak now just happens to be a leader of an uprising that fits every detail of the plan that he set out three years ago to mount a coup by misleading the Israeli public and enlisting them as useful idiots. Are we really supposed to believe this is just an astonishing coincidence?
The Barak video is virtually unknown in America or Britain, where the media hasn’t reported it.
If you look up Barak’s history, you’ll be reminded that he was the head of the Labor Party and was part of the failed 2000 Camp David negotiations. But there’s a lot more, some of it sympathetic (all four of his grandparents were killed either in pogroms or in death camps) and some of it courageous. An example of some of the latter:
Barak led several highly acclaimed operations, such as: “Operation Isotope”, the mission to free the hostages on board the hijacked Sabena Flight 571 at Lod Airport in 1972; the covert 1973 Israeli raid on Lebanon in Beirut, in which he was disguised as a woman to kill members of the Palestine Liberation Organization; Barak was also a key architect of the June 1976 Operation Entebbe, another rescue mission to free the hostages of the Air France aircraft hijacked by terrorists and forced to land at the Entebbe Airport in Uganda. These highly acclaimed operations, along with Operation Bayonet, led to the dismantling of Palestinian terrorist cell Black September …
Barak was awarded the Medal of Distinguished Service and four Chief of Staff citations (Tzalash HaRamatkal) for courage and operational excellence. These five decorations make him the most decorated soldier in Israeli history …
In addition, just to round things out:
Barak enjoys reading works by writers such as Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, and he is a classical pianist, with many years of study behind him.
Barak earned his bachelor’s degree in physics and mathematics from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in 1968, and his master’s degree in engineering-economic systems in 1978 from Stanford University, California.
However, Barak is now 81 years old. Maybe he’s lost a few steps, and that accounts for his recent actions? If in the video Barak says what Phillips claims he says, the content is shocking – that is, it would be shocking except for all the things we’ve seen happen in this country during the last few years.
A coup at this point would be expected.
To protect Democracy, of course.
I have often wondered what would have happened had the Democrats failed to find enough mail-in-ballots to win the Presidency in 2020- a coup was at the top my list.
Need to see the transcript. Seems outlandish.
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Recall that Barak is pure poison politically. The Labor Party and its precursors won a plurality in every election held from 1920 to 1973. They were the lead party in every coalition government for 29 years (1948-77). They were a vigorous competitor to Likud for 24 years (1977-2001). Then they began crashing down hill. Bar one reprieve, they lost their position as the principal opposition party in 2009 and by 2019 they’d joined the ranks of Israel’s many splinter parties, corralling 4.5% of the electorate. The almost relentless decline – as if the actuarial tables were chewing the party to pieces – began with Barak’s tenure and the catastrophic failure of his diplomatic initiatives in 2000. His last effort was to form another splinter party and associate it with a mess of extant Green organizations and lefty dissenters, principally Meretz. They scored some seats in one election (principally Meretz members) then disappeared.
Oof, what a nasty little man. Don’t be fooled by the heroics from his early days (see, e.g., John McCain) nor shamed into silence by his grievous family history.
Isreal and the United States are vastly different countries with vastly different social, cultural and political structures. Moreover, while they share some personality traits and a fair bit of their nationalistic outlook, Bibi and Trump are vastly different men.
Nonetheless, it behooves us to pay close attention to what is happening to Bibi. It is not at all outside the realm of possibility that something similar will happen to Trump (or any Republican) should the GOP win the White House in 2024.
Another color revolution, sigh.
So many similarities with the events leading up to 2020 us election.
if memory serves, he was bibi’s boss at sayaret metkal, the israeli special forces unit, he was also strongly tied to epstein in the last few years,
Wow – Barak met Epstein 30 times.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/ehud-barak-met-with-jeffrey-epstein-dozens-of-times-flew-on-private-plane-report/
Ray SoCa:
One thing it’s important to understand – whether about Barak or tons of other people left of center – is that Epstein was a rich guy who donated a lot of money to liberal and leftist causes. Many people who met with him had relationships with him that had to do with that. As for the sex stuff, we certainly know Epstein was guilty, and a few other people have been implicated (falsely or correctly) by some of the women, but it is almost certainly the case that a great many people connected with Epstein were not part of that. What the percentages are is anyone’s guess. The rumor mill flies. But I see no particular reason to think that the majority were doing the sex stuff.
Barak, Barack, Barack, Barak
Let’s call the whole thing off!
–apologies to George Gershwin
Personal bravery and military aptitude don’t necessarily translate to conservative or even moderate politics. The myth of an egalitarian society can be believed by heroes and villains alike.
Bibi certainly seems to draw the hatred of lefties. Much like Trump does here. It’s a terrible thing for both countries.
I can attest that Netanyahu’s superb autobiography Bibi contains some poison pen for Barak. Here’s how Andrew Roberts characterized it in the Claremont Review of Books, https://claremontreviewofbooks.com/the-churchill-of-the-middle-east/:
Although there are excellent pen portraits of Yitzhak Rabin, Ariel Sharon, Shimon Peres, Yitzhak Shamir, and several other Israeli politicians, Ehud Barak will not be happy with the way he is portrayed in relation to the Sabena operation at Lod Airport, as “a bystander. His only role in storming the plane was standing on the tarmac and blowing a whistle. Four of his decorations were given not for leadership under fire but for intelligence gathering operations.” Ouch!
Neo – My gut feeling is Epstein’s foibles with an underage harem were used as a honey pot for at least one Intel agency. The recording, and how those have disappeared, are very suspicious.
The innocent explanation is Epstein just had a kinky habits of recording powerful guests, and the FBI protected innocent blackmailed parties by slow walking warrants to get the recordings.
And perhaps Barak was just looking for funding for his liberal, political party from Epstein. Or repaying a debt to help out Epstein.
JJ on July 31, 2023 at 11:30 pm said:
Personal bravery and military aptitude don’t necessarily translate to conservative or even moderate politics. The myth of an egalitarian society can be believed by heroes and villains alike.
________
Exactly. It’s an error to think that if someone is admirable in some way(s), it follows that he is in others. I think this has something to do with the desire to stick up for artists and athletes.
I have a friend who likes to point out that, had Benedict Arnold died of his wounds at Saratoga, there’d be high schools all over America named after him. And had Petain died in 1939, the same would be true in France.
One thing that is interesting is that such deep societal divisions have opened up in 3 stalwarts of the West.
Whose next and what is the reason for such “coincidental” timing?
And perhaps Barak was just looking for funding for his liberal, political party from Epstein. Or repaying a debt to help out Epstein.
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Barak formed the Israel Democratic Party just two weeks before Epstein was clapped in jail for the last time. That wasn’t the reason.
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If Barak did meet with Epstein 20x, that is … inneresting.