THE VIEW FROM ISRAEL

OLITICAL COMMENTARY in Israel has recently focused on the 10th anniversary of the Second Lebanon War and the strengthening of the right. Each has been dealt with separately but, in fact, they are intimately connected. One of the key legacies of that war has been the rise of the right, but not in the way most commentators conceive of it.

There is a consensus that the old secular elite is being replaced by a more rightwing religious Israel. But, in assessing such claims, it is important to take into account the Israeli penchant for hyperbole. This is particularly important if you happen to live in the land of understatement, where serious problems are often categorised merely as “a spot of bother”.

We have the most right-wing coalition since 1990-92, but the right-religious bloc won slightly fewer seats in 2015 than in 2013. The national-religious, who constitute the ideological core of the settler movement, have become more prominent. However, one expression of this has been the rise of moderate national-religious figures in the centrist party, Yesh Atid.

Then there is the question of what it now means to be on the “right”. In the 1980s,