The Not-So-Strange Death of Israel’s Labor Party

Abstract

Though he ultimately could not dethrone Netanyahu, Benny Gantz in 2019 and 2020 succeeded by running an old Labor Party–style campaign—but without laborers. Like earlier Labor candidates, Gantz was a general, patriotic rather than woke, and a man of few words. But unlike them, he was neither dependent on, nor constrained by, the Histadrut. As I noted previously, elsewhere in the world his efforts would be seen as a classic center-right campaign. Looking forward, some melancholy about the fate of Israeli Labor is certainly justified—as is some trepidation about the politics of the state in the years ahead if the movement’s true animating impulse is left behind. If “start-up nation” is to crash, the country will require an organized political force that can reenergize the productivity of the state and aim to create high-paying jobs for its workers. The torch of national developmentalism—the original aim of Israel’s Labor Par ty—might now have to be carried by others. This article originally appeared in American Affairs Volume IV, Number 2 (Summer 2020): 168–81.