The 69-year-old ‘Bibi’ is the quintessential political survivor. He is also the quintessential symbol of everything wrong with Israel in the modern world. Whatever the flaws of its original conception, the country started out with a degree of humanistic Left vision of all that was best about cosmopolitan Jewish culture. Today, after four terms of Bibi’s leadership, it has deteriorated into a nationalistic garrison state where debate about peace with and justice for Palestinians is scarcely visible.
Bibi has many similarities to other larger-than-life rightwing populist icons such as Silvio Berlusconi and Donald Trump – all have persistently clung to power despite well-known personal malfeasance, due to their ability to portray opponents as either out of touch elitists or dangerously subversive. All have maintained a fanatical following easily mobilized through nationalist posturing and by ruthless scapegoating of disadvantaged groups. All are self-aggrandizing playboy types with a taste for ill-gotten luxury.
