But when the state was founded, the Israelis had more in mind than security. My father likes to say it was a state founded by socialists, people who believed that all men are created equal and should live according to his ability. Between the state and the kibbutz, romantically speaking, capitalism wasn't all that important. Laid low by the second intifada, Israel decided to liberalize its economy during the 2003-5 finance ministry of Binyamin Netanyahu (please excuse the wikipedia link; the footnotes should help). At worst, the reforms were derided by those in Labor (and even Netanyahu's Likud) as "Thatcherite." Some are more critical of him than others, of course. Haaretz attacks his "anti-Churchillian" policies that destroyed the egalitarian framework that kept the country together. The article blasts him for his Reagan-Thatcherism: "For instead of creating an economic and social powerhouse capable of meeting the challenges that surround it, he created a robber state that serves the settlers, the ultra-Orthodox and the tycoons." But his so-called "obeisance" to the market played a role in helping boost Israel's economy to its current heights. Israel is doing better now than it has in some time.
So why did 250,000 march for social justice as Israel enjoys 5.7% unemployment and 4.8% growth during an anemic worldwide recovery? The marchers blame wage disparities (the highest among the OECD countries) and (illiberal) wage disparities for their plight. Overall, these people feel that there is an economic miracle going on and they are not a part of it. The Netanyahu ministry is trying to respond- it "vowed to free up more state-owned land for development, build more low-rent housing and improve public transport. It also wants to lower dairy prices with more imports and boost medical staff numbers to address demands by striking doctors." But more and more parties are joining in. Kadima in particular is supporting it (and claiming that Netanyahu is igoring their demands), and parties as disparate in politics as the Arab-Israeli UAL-Ta'al and the rightwing National Union have thrown their support behind the protests.
Why now? For one, Israel seems to be "between wars" and unable to do much on the security front. Little can be done on the Palestinian question at the moment. The Oslo Peace Process has come to a stop; some respectable journalists claim that "The Oslo Process is over." Netanyahu is trying to fight the UN's recognition of the Palestinian state, but that's a lost cause as long as Oslo is frozen. Such a fight is determined at the level of the United Nations General Assembly, where no country can veto its decisions. That's how the UN got involved in the Suez crisis- neither Britain nor France could veto the General Assembly decision. Furthermore, the People's Republic of China got the "China" seat in the same way in 1971. Unless Israel can convince a majority of the 193 members of the UN that it should not recognize Palestine, then Palestine will be seen as a sovereign country with its own representative. Perhaps they feel that America's ability to veto its move to the General Assembly will be enough. Although I wonder, then, why France and the UK did not prevent the Suez issue from going to the General Assembly...
Regardless of the maneuvering on the Palestinian question, it is interesting to see that Israel's population wants to focus on economics instead. Israel is not an Arab autocracy that is trying to maintain its gerontocracy; its closer to Spain's economic protests, even if the Arab Spring had its own economic elements (the Tunisian revolt, and through it the whole movement, began when one Tunisian burned himself over his economic situation). It is just a normal country with normal problems, and that is what the economic protests remind us about.
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