Israel’s foreign policy is not always typical of a “sister democracy,” including covert actions that could undermine the country’s strategic alliances in the U.S. and Europe.
As the rift between the Biden administration and the Israeli government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu deepens over the war in Gaza, tensions have also heightened over what each side perceives as interference in its domestic politics.
This came to a head last month when Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer expressed hope for early elections in Israel. In response, Netanyahu went on American television to castigate the Democratic senator from New York for trespassing on Israeli democracy. “It’s inappropriate to go to a sister democracy and try to replace the elected leadership there,” Netanyahu said. “That’s something that Israel … does on its own, and we’re not a banana republic.”
President Biden implicitly embraced Schumer’s words, and national security advisor Jake Sullivan noted the irony of “the prime minister speaking on American television about his concerns about Americans interfering in Israeli politics” — something that, Sullivan added, U.S. officials don’t do nearly as much on Israeli television as Israelis do on U.S. television.
Of course, the U.S. has also engaged in a long line of interventions in other countries’ internal affairs, including fomenting regime change. That said, the way Israel conducts its foreign policy is not always typical of a “sister democracy” either. Israel’s covert actions should be troubling, for their potential of undermining the country’s key strategic alliances.
A March report showed that Israeli authorities had been carrying out an influence operation on social media platforms. Discovered by an Israeli online watchdog, the campaign used hundreds of fake accounts to amplify claims that Palestinian employees of UNRWA, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees, took part in Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack on Israel. Democratic lawmakers were among the primary targets of the campaign, which aimed to persuade them to block the agency’s U.S. funding.
This secret influence campaign is an egregious violation of democratic norms.
