Israel: Politics on Penelope’s Loom

Israel, that fragile miracle and ongoing nervous breakdown, is once again hard at work on its favourite pastime: weaving a government by day and unravelling it by night. Penelope had her loom to ward off suitors; we have ours to ward off responsibility. Different motives, same threadbare result.

“Unity,” they say. As if chanting the word enough times will stop knives from being planted squarely in each other’s backs. The coalition plays musical chairs while the opposition lurks with popcorn, waiting for someone to trip. Meanwhile, the public? We’re the furniture — sat on, scratched, rearranged, and occasionally set on fire.

At the centre of it all, the Prime Minister wobbles across his tightrope, juggling flaming swords while blindfolded. He lurches to appease the zealots, pirouettes to pacify the so-called moderates, and somehow always lands with both feet firmly planted on his own survival. Policy? Oh no, darling. That would imply a plan. What we have is improvisation disguised as leadership — and it’s starting to look like a child hammering at piano keys and calling it a symphony.

And yet, while this farce staggers on, fifty of our people remain in Gaza. Fifty hostages: real, breathing human beings — or perhaps corpses by now — whose existence has been reduced to occasional bargaining chips in a game of “who blinks first.” We’re told nothing. Are they alive? Are they dead? Who knows. But better not to ask, lest it spoil the coalition’s dinner party.

Israel is brilliant at survival, I’ll give us that. We stagger, we stumble, but we refuse to fall. Fractured, ferocious, endlessly improvising — it’s our national art form. But here’s the problem with endless improvisation: sooner or later, the audience realises the actors don’t know their lines. And when the set collapses, it’s not the clowns who get crushed — it’s us in the stalls.

So forgive me if I don’t stand and applaud. The loom keeps unravelling, the acrobats keep wobbling, and all we’re promised is more of the same. Israel will endure, of course, it will. It always does. But enduring isn’t the same as safe. Enduring is just the art of living on the edge and pretending we enjoy the view.