PFEFFER’S ISRAEL
THE VIDEO meetings of Israel’s coronavirus cabinet are notoriously indiscreet. Dozens of ministers, officials and advisors take part and access codes circulate widely. Political journalists eavesdrop easily and the proceedings are routinely live-tweeted. Ministers complain but take the opportunity to grandstand.
On Tuesday afternoon, the cabinet was expecting a summons to yet another meeting on the chaotic exit strategy from the third lockdown. But instead, a small number of them, members of the smaller security cabinet, were told to go immediately to secure locations for a meeting on a much more private network. The military censor instructed the media not to report the details. They were allowed only to disclose that the meeting concerned “a humanitarian matter” and the Russian government.
Rumours circulated like wildfire. Russia controls Syria and at Israel’s request has carried out investigations and searches for the bodies of Israeli soldiers missing since the first Lebanon War in 1982 and even for Israel’s most celebrated spy, Eli Cohen, who was executed in Damascus in 1965.
When the actual details were finally cleared for publication, it turned out to be a less historic case. A women from the strictly-Orthodox town of Modi’in Illit had crossed the border to Syria a few months ago, seemingly for romantic purposes, and got arrested. The Russians are now brokering a prisoner exchange: the formerly Charedi woman in return for two residents of northern Israel who were arrested for Hezbollah espionage and propaganda.
The timing is intriguing, however. In the weeks before each of the past three elections, there were similar developments. Russia located and repatriated from Syria the body of an Israeli MIA, an Israeli tourist imprisoned in Moscow for carrying drugs was released by the Kremlin, and Eli Cohen’s watch was located by Mossad. Surely there was no connection, but each time it happened at a fortuitous moment for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
In a radio interview on Wednesday, Mr Netanyahu said that
“we are in the middle of secret talks,” but was willing to disclose that “I’m using my personal relationship with President Putin.” Always useful to have a direct line to the Kremlin.
BIBI UNSETTLED, FOR ONCE
That was Mr Netanyahu’s third interview in six days. In between elections, months, sometimes years, can pass without the prime minister giving an interview to Israeli media. Then comes the pre-election blitz when it’s almost impossible to switch on a television or radio without seeing or hearing him. But that usually happens in the last few days of the campaign. This time, the media onslaught is taking place five weeks before election day, much earlier than usual.
Likud is stuck in the polls at under thirty Knesset seats. It has lost about twenty percent of its voters from a year ago. Eight weeks after the world beating vaccination roll out began, the centrepiece