How Yair Netanyahu's mockery of protesters fits in Bibi's plan
While his son ridicules the mass demonstrations on Twitter, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is exploiting the protests against him to unify his own camp.
“My father is a strong man," said Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s son Yair. "He sees the same scenes that we all see, those aliens from outer space at the demonstrations. It amuses him. It’s like entertainment. Sometimes I show him select scenes from the demonstrations. I try to make sure that they are not too crude. It entertains him. It even gives him a little strength.”
The interview, which aired Aug. 3 on the right-leaning Galei Israel radio station, seems likely to become one of the iconic moments of this period. It will certainly feature in the election campaign of Netanyahu’s rivals.
Netanyahu's opponents likely consider this testimony straight from Netanyahu’s house symbolic of the prime minister’s total detachment from reality. The remarks intended to delegitimize the young demonstrators and their motivations paint an almost picturesque image of the prime minister sitting with his son and watching the demonstrators with amusement, and could prove lethal to his public image.
Retired Brig. Gen. Amos Haskel, a leader of the demonstrators outside the prime minister’s residence, tweeted, “Yair, I suggest that you and your father pay a visit to Independence Park, 500 meters from your home on Balfour Street, to see young people with nothing left in the refrigerator. If you have any bit of a heart left, you won’t laugh. You’ll cry. Yair, the public has already awakened. Our space ship has already taken off.”
