EXTREME RIGHT WING VIOLENCE REEMERGES AS

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 TEL AVIV 002218

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 09/05/2018
TAGS: PTER PGOV PINR IS
SUBJECT: EXTREME RIGHT WING VIOLENCE REEMERGES AS
DISTURBING ISRAELI ISSUE

Classified By: Deputy Chief of Mission Luis G. Moreno, Reason 1.4 (b) (
d)


1. (C) SUMMARY: Late in the night of September 24, Israel
Prize winner Ze'ev Sternhell was wounded in the leg by a
pipe-bomb that exploded next to the gate of his Jerusalem
residence. Sternhell, a political science professor known
for his opposition to the settlers and the nationalist
right-wing, is now recovering in the hospital. Jerusalem
police searching the area around his home found fliers
offering a reward of more than one million shekels (close to
USD 300,00) to anyone who kills a member of the Peace Now
movement. The fliers, signed by an unknown group calling
itself the Army of State Liberationists, also condemn the
entire secular Israeli state and call for the establishment
of a state based on orthodox Jewish law in the West Bank.
Security has been stepped up around the anti-settlement Peace
Now movement and police investigators say they believe
right-wing extremists are behind both incidents. Peace Now
secretary general Yariv Oppenheimer says law enforcement must
end its lenient policy towards lawbreakers before another
political assassination occurs in Israel. The attack was
quickly condemned by Israeli politicians across the full
political spectrum, including Kadima Chairperson Tzipi Livni,
Labor Chairman Ehud Barak, Likud Chairperson Benjamin
Netanyahu, and even far-right Members of Knesset like Effie
Eitam (National Union-NRP). While settler violence against
Palestinians in the West Bank has been building for months
and recently even included assaults by settlers on IDF
soldiers, it has not generated the kind of broad-gauged
condemnation that we are now seeing. We will follow up with
the Israel Security Agency regarding the threat posed by
settler extremists. End Summary.

--------------
NOT WITHOUT PRECEDENT
--------------


2. (SBU) While most Israelis associate political
assassination attempts with the 1995 killing of Prime
Minister Yizchak Rabin by right-wing student Yigal Amir, the
targeting of rank and file left-wing activists by the
far-right has a history here that includes the killing of
Israeli peace activist Emil Grunzweig, during a Peace Now
rally in Jerusalem, in February 1983. The rally, demanding
that then PM Begin implement the Kahan Commission findings on
the Sabra and Shatila massacres in Lebanon, was dramatically
disrupted when a right wing activist hurled a grenade at the
marchers killing Grunzweig and injuring several others,
including Avraham Burg, later to become Speaker of the
Knesset. Violence among Jews also has a history in the
pre-state era, including the assassination by right-wing
extremists of Labor Zionist leader Chaim Arlosoroff on the
streets of Tel Aviv in the 1930s, and David Ben Gurion's
decision to sink the Irgun arms ship the Altalena -- with
Menachem Begin on board -- off the coast of Tel Aviv during
the War of Independence. During World War II, left wing
Jewish activists helped the British track down and sometimes
kill leaders of the Jewish far right, including David Stern,
the head of the Etzel underground group, which the British
dubbed the Stern Gang.

-------------- ---
LAW-MAKERS DEMAND ZERO-TOLERANCE OF LAW BREAKERS
-------------- ---


3. (U) The shock waves generated by the Sternhell incident
elicited quick condemnations from Knesset members and
political leaders. Foreign Minister Livni called Professor
Sternhell's family to express her sympathy and, at a Rosh
Hashanah event at the MFA, said "something intolerable
occurred which cannot be silenced." Opposition Likud Party
leader Netanyahu also called the family, telling Sternhell's
wife that "this is a sickening attack by abominable people
who are not part of the public debate in Israel. They need
to be distanced from society and placed behind lock and key."
Meanwhile, at a meeting of the Labor Party Knesset faction,
Defense Minister Barak warned that "we are returning to a
dark period...".


4. (U) The Knesset Committee on the Interior is planning a
special session and its chairman, Labor's Ofir Pines, has
demanded that law enforcement apprehend and imprison those
responsible. His Kadima colleague, MK Menachem Ben-Sasson,
who chairs the Knesset Law Committee, says the attack must
not be dismissed as scare tactics. "It threatens the entire
Israeli society." Ben-Sasson has issued a call to settler
leaders and right-wing rabbis to put an end to attacks on
those whose views differ from their own. Even MK Effie Eitam
(National Union-NRP),a strong supporter of the settlement
movement, condemned the attack, saying, "those behind this
heinous act do not represent the values of Judaism and the

TEL AVIV 00002218 002 OF 002


love of Israel. My objections to Sternhell's outrageous
opinions aside, I wholly object to any attempt to silence
opinions through violent means."

--------------
PEACE NOW: BUSINESS AS USUAL
--------------


5. (SBU) Yariv Oppenheimer, Peace Now Secretary General,
told PolOff after the attack that he sees this action and the
threats against members of his organization, as part of the
recent pattern of increasing violence in the West Bank. He
believes the violent right-wing extremists are emboldened by
the fact that there have been little or no official response,
even as violence escalates.


6. (SBU) Oppenheimer said that he had not seen the
threatening flyer, except on TV, but that they are taking it
seriously. However, he emphasized that Peace Now will not be
deterred. While he had extra police protection in the
morning of September 25, they had left by the afternoon. He
said that no other members of Peace Now received additional
protection, but Peace Now is meeting with the police to
determine what steps should be taken. Oppenheimer added
that, in some ways, "if they are not threatening us, we are
not doing our job."


7. (U) Professor Sternhell is a highly controversial
intellectual figure whose criticism of the settler movement
is seen by the right as inflammatory. In an article that
appeared in Ha'aretz at the height of the Second Intifada, he
wrote "had the Palestinians the least bit of sense they would
have concentrated their struggle against the settlements and
would not plant explosives on the western side of the Green
Line." This has been taken by the settler movement and
others to go beyond freedom of expression, qualifying as
incitement to kill settlers. Incitement to kill is illegal
under Israeli law. Far-right activist Baruch Marzel, who was
asked if his National Jewish Front had any connection to the
Sternhell attack, denied involvement but would not condemn it
"because in the past Professor Sternhell expressed views that
it was legitimate to attack settlers."


8. (C) Comment. The attack on Professor Sternhell has
touched a nerve. After months of media reporting on violent
settler attacks on Palestinians (and recently even IDF
soldiers and officers) in the West Bank that failed to
generate much public comment, the failed bomb attack on
Sternhell resulted in a welcome storm of condemnation by
politicians, editorialists and commentators. Noted novelist
A.B. Yehoshua in the September 26 Ma'ariv blamed the
mainstream settler movement for having created an
out-of-control monster among settler youth. Assuming that
the fliers left near the scene of the bombing are genuine,
they are directed not just against Peace Now but the entire
secular State of Israel. We are engaging with the Israel
Security Agency (ISA or Shin Bet) regarding measures they are
taking to deal with this latest manifestation of extreme
right-wing violence in Israel.

********************************************* ********************
Visit Embassy Tel Aviv's Classified Website:
http://www.state.sgov.gov/p/nea/telaviv

You can also access this site through the State Department's
Classified SIPRNET website.
********************************************* ********************
CUNNINGHAM