Foreign Ministry's Greatest Fear Realized: The Settlers Are Coming

Behind the campaign against the appointment of settler leader Dani Dayan as ambassador to Brazil lie the fears that the proud nationalists are daring to come out of the sidelines.

Israel Harel, haaretz.com

Dayan image from article

Excerpt:

It seems that Haaretz columnist Ari Shavit and MK Shelly Yacimovich (Zionist Union) did not delve too deeply into the dirty methods being used in the bid to block Dani Dayan’s appointment as ambassador to Brazil. Like other decent people, Shavit and Yacimovich emphasized Dayan’s skills, good personal characteristics and his suitability to the position, despite their ideological differences with him. But it is actually Dayan’s suitability to the post that is keeping his detractors awake at night.

Here is the conspiratorial thought that guides them: After settling into places of influence — such as the Israel Defense Forces, the security services, the media, academia and even, very gradually, the judicial system — where in the past they had been shunted to the sidelines, now “they” are daring to settle in the Foreign Ministry, too.

To prevent this desecration, all means are permitted, allowed, including a delegitimization campaign in Brazil itself. The name may be Dani Dayan, but the target is the spread of a nationalist perspective in Israeli public diplomacy, which until now they have managed to prevent in the ministry that is supposed to carry and represent it, especially when this is the government’s foreign policy.

This conduct continues even after decades of official Likud rule. The ministry’s old guard, which never fully came to terms with the change of government, dictated the public diplomacy line and the appointments policy (with the exception of political appointments — a few of which were truly inappropriate, but for personal and performance reasons).

Consuls and ambassadors, who as civil servants are supposed to be loyal to the policies of the government, which they ostensibly represent, did exactly as they pleased — sometimes in demonstrative defiance — in order to represent their own oppositionary, and even extremist, positions. ...