Israel gets F in democratic tolerance: The case of Israel Frey
“The world is a better place this morning, without five young men who partook in one of the most brutal crimes against humanity.” This is a translation of the tweet of Israel Frey, an ultra-Orthodox journalist who has lately been without an outlet also because of his extremely leftist anti-Zionist views, referring to the five IDF soldiers who were killed on Monday night by Hamas-detonated roadside bombs in Northern Gaza. “Unfortunately, for the boy in Gaza now being operated on without anesthesia, the girl starving to death, and the family huddling in a tent under bombardment — this is not enough,” Frey proceeded. “This is a call to every Israeli mother,” Frey suggested: “Do not be the next to receive your son in a coffin as a war criminal. Refuse.”
This quite possibly annoying but legitimate criticism of the IDF was not accepted as such by the law enforcement agencies. Within merely a few hours of publication, the State Attorney gave the police a green light to probe Frey on incitement offenses. A special task force was immediately appointed to analyze rather simplistic sentences. After all, what is there to investigate? Clearly, Frey is not in line with the mainstay of Israeli society, where combat soldiers (and soldiers who died in service overall) gain automatic apotheosis. In contrast, Frey believes that context does matter; a soldier who dies in an unnecessary war, let alone when he ends his life in an operation involving war crimes, is not a saint. He feels no mercy for the parents of such a soldier. Some may say that Frey is insensitive to pain. Frey would probably reply that showing sensitivity to the pain of Israeli families who lost their son in Gaza is like expressing historical condolence to German families who lost their beloved family members in the battle over the Warsaw Ghetto. This way or another, there is nothing in Frey’s words that even slightly resembles a criminal offence.
This is not the first time that Frey has been called for investigation. In April of this year, Frey was questioned by the police because of another tweet, where he claimed that Palestinians who attack soldiers in the occupied West Bank are not terrorists but oppressed people fighting for justice, liberation, and freedom. Obviously, this view of Frey is shared by very few Israelis, but again, there is nothing criminal about it.
The ongoing Frey saga is a case study of democratic tolerance, where Israel gets an F. If Frey was speaking in Europe, his views about Israel would be regarded as middle-ground. In Israel, he is an extremist, indicating how detached Israel is from the Western world, but Frey is not the sole indicator of this detachment. The recent attempt to impeach MK Ayman Odeh, head of the predominantly Arab Hadash-Ta’al party, because he dared to equate Israeli hostages held in Gaza with Palestinian security prisoners held in Israel is another example. In Israeli eyes, the equation seems blasphemous, but objectively speaking, it holds water. Most of the hostages that are still held in Gaza by Hamas are soldiers whose mission was to guard the Gaza strip border. Thus, they are war prisoners and not abductees, whereas many Palestinians detained by Israel for long periods were never charged.
Yet, the most bothersome point to me is the curtailing of democracy and the limitation of freedom of speech by “cool down” police investigations and legal procedures targeting “annoying views.” This strategy is typical of semi-autocratic regimes like Singapore and Turkey, and even Hamas. Hamas leadership never pretended to offer freedom of speech. During our never-ending war against Hamas, we have actually become more and more similar to the enemy, which we ironically claim must be annihilated because it is not democratic.
