Susan Hattis Rolef claimed in her Monday column, “
Witch-hunt or proper
neutrality?,” that the forced “exile” of Dr. Gilad Nathan from his position as a
researcher in the Knesset Research and Information Center was justified and not
the result of a witch-hunt.
Rolef is somewhat apologetic in basing her
support for Nathan’s purported exile on her determination that Eyal Yinon, the
legal adviser who asked that Nathan be transitioned from his position, is
“certainly not a radical Rightwinger.”
The issue I take with Rolef’s
interpretation of the affair is that it leads the reader to believe that this
was a borderline case, which could have gone either way. It was close enough to
being a “witchhunt” to even raise the question, and only her personal
acquaintance with Yinon allows her to draw the conclusion that this was a
neutral, professional decision.
This impression is
misleading.
Once the facts were published in the website Mida and
elsewhere, the Knesset was compelled, almost against its will, to take immediate
meaningful action (regardless of any politics or ideologies). The extremity of
Nathan’s conduct both as a publicist and as a researcher left no one any real
choice.
It is true the Knesset’s first reaction was to defend
Dr. Nathan's research? Interestingly, at first the Knesset also defended
his published political articles. This is simply the natural instinct of an
institution to defend itself and its workers. But, to the Knesset’s credit, the
people in charge also launched an internal examination.
Now, a mere few
weeks later, the Knesset no longer defends Gilad’s columns and is even starting
to back away from his professional work. I will very briefly explain why this
shift, which was – as Rolef admits – entirely professional, took
place.
First, let us consider Nathan’s political articles. A few examples
of the manner in which this Knesset employee wrote about Israel and Israeli
politics will help clarify the Knesset’s response.
For Nathan, Israel is
composed of: “Cossacks on the hills, the nationalistic militarism of the
political center… the blood and land thirst and racist fascism of the Israeli
Right. The Right… in its Israeli religious-nationalist version, always loved
blood, and they will fight over the [Jewish] farmers’ right to spill the blood
of [Arab] thieves, for the thieves sin against our nation, on our national land;
spilling their blood only completes the grotesque fulfillment of the ‘Blut und
Boden’ [Blood and Soil, a Nazi ideology] worldview.”
For Nathan, the
settlers are: “Pogromists… ‘victimized’ Cossacks rampaging in the city streets
fueled by racism and lust for loot… Judeo-pogromists… circumcised
Cossacks.”
Nathan also related to specific politicians and parties. For
example, he called Ehud Barak “the Israeli version of Napoleon,” and wrote that
the Austrian extreme Right-winger and anti-Semitic Jörg Haider would have been
too mild for the Israel Beitenu and Haichud Haleumi parties. There is plenty
more, but this should probably suffice.
Clearly, Nathan should find it
hard to work with more than 60 percent of the Knesset, without raising the issue
of his collaboration with Nazilike people.
I S NATHAN’S professional work
“immaculate,” Rolef writes? Here too, there is more than meets the
eye.
After Nathan’s work on immigration was criticized by Ma’ariv and
Mida, it was reviewed by an independent expert, commissioned by the Knesset. The
reviewer found that Nathan wrongly claimed that Israel is not among the leading
destination states for illegal immigrants, and that the main piece of data
Nathan used in order to substantiate this claim (and that is still echoed in the
press and in the Knesset) was “irrelevant.”
The reviewer writes that “the
criticism leveled at the report, stating that Israel’s position was not
accurately presented as being among the leading countries… compared to the West
and Europe in particular, is justified.”
Moreover, Dan Landau, the
Knesset’s CEO, admitted in Haaretz this Monday that “there were several flaws in
his [Nathan’s] research.”
I will not dwell on the second article Mida
published concerning Nathan’s work. Briefly, Nathan falsely claimed that crime
rates among illegal immigrants are lower than among the general population;
suffice it to say that every senior policeman who related to the issue refuted
Nathan’s spurious conclusion, specifically with regard to violent
crimes.
Lastly, Rolef claims that “what happened to Nathan wouldn’t have
happened if he had belonged to the Radical right.” This is true, but not in the
sense that she intends. If a radical Right-wing Knesset employee would publicly
express the above political views not about the Jews but rather about Arabs, he
would not be shifted to a different job within the Knesset, as Nathan was; he
would be fired on the spot (and, I might add, with my full support).
The
reverse of Rolef’s thesis is closer to the truth: only because Nathan is a
Left-wing radical, protected by the Leftwing media and various radical NGO’s
(among them the Israeli Communist Party), is he treated so gently. In addition,
in the case of radical Rightwinger employee, the Left would not ask anyone to
differentiate between the professional and political, but would insist on his
removal from any position he might hold.
Therefore, in this case, there
can be no doubt that the only one to blame for the removal of Gilad Nathan is
Nathan himself.
The writer is the editor of the conservative website
Mida.