We need to talk about Amichai Chikli. As a phenomenon, as a symbol. It never seems important enough: One week there are missiles, another week there’s a government coup, but in the end we don’t talk about Chikli.
This is exactly what normalization looks like: People shrug, look away, repress, grow accustomed, and then one fine day a guy looks around and sees that he’s surrounded by Chiklis. That his government is filled with them. Maybe it’s actually a Chikli government, not a Netanyahu government. Even though they’re basically the same thing.
There’s a good reason Benjamin Netanyahu once turned to right-wing politicians and cried out: “Be Chikli!” But that’s Netanyahu, so the command should of course be the exact opposite.
Chikli frequently tweets toxically about Aharon Barak, the former Supreme Court president, and Ehud Barak, the former prime minister, as though he were the last of the bots or mouthpieces, a loyal soldier of Yair Netanyahu.
I knew Chikli before he entered politics. I look at him and simply can’t believe what he’s become. He proves that the 2018 Nahal Tzafit disaster, in which 10 teens died in a flash flood, wasn’t the only reason to reevaluate the entire issue of Israel’s pre-military academies. Hundreds of teenagers passed under his hands, at a sensitive, critical time, shortly before conscription.
Full disclosure: Chikli invited me a few times to talk about the West Bank territories with his students at the Tavor pre-military leadership academy that he found and led. He insisted I come, and I came. I thought it was important to talk with them about how I see the occupation, the settlements, military service, patriotism and love of Israel. I admired Chikli’s resolve to expose them to positions other than his own. And then he was parachuted into the Knesset courtesy of Naftali Bennett, and immediately after the election he stabbed Bennett in the back. Who does something like that, especially after working in education?
Chikli didn’t resign, he simply defected. When he was prohibited from running with a new party, in accordance with legislation passed in the wake of the escapades of a different Knesset-seat thief, Orly Levy-Abekasis, he petitioned the High Court of Justice. The same High Court he now reviles. It was clear how it would end – with a reserved slot on the Likud slate and a cabinet seat, just like with Idit Silman. The mafia rewards its own.
We also need to talk about Chikli’s portfolios. He was appointed minister of Diaspora affairs. What authority does he have, what does he contribute? Did anyone ask Diaspora communities if they want a cabinet minister? For that we have the Jewish Agency, whose necessity is also far from certain.
Chikli, of course, isn’t alone, far from it. This government consists of 38 ministers and deputy ministers, most of them redundant.
May Golan, who once told a female human rights activist she should be raped by Sudanese men and called MK Merav Ben Ari “a chicken, cluck cluck,” was sworn in on Monday as minister for the advancement of women. This ministry, which was split off from the unnecessary Ministry for Social Equality – Chikli’s second portfolio – was invented for the aforementioned Levy-Abekasis. Before the confirmation vote in the Knesset Monday Golan was removed from the chamber after calling Ben Ari: “scumbag, hypocrite, lowlife.”
Galit Distal-Atbaryan is minister of public diplomacy, who deals with government propaganda. Amichai Eliyahu is heritage minister. Since when do we need a heritage minister? We already have a religious services minister and an education minister. But in this government Jewish heritage also has its own minister, a different one: Meir Porush, whose ministry also handles Jerusalem affairs. Why isn’t there a minister for Petah Tikva affairs?
Orit Strock is minister of national missions. What are her missions? What strategic affairs does Ron Dermer handle? What does Gila Gamliel do as intelligence minister? The Air Force doesn’t have a minister. Nor does the artillery corps. No wonder she signed the Yad Vashem visitors’ book as “defense minister.” The Labor and Social Affairs Ministry was split into labor minister (Yoav Bentzur) and social affairs minister (Yaakov Margi). Haim Biton is a minister in the Education Ministry. David Amsalem is a minister in the Justice Ministry.
This government isn’t only terrible and failing, it is also corrupt and corrupting to the core.
We Need to Talk About Israel's Diaspora Minister and His Phony Portfolio
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05.05.2023
We need to talk about Amichai Chikli. As a phenomenon, as a symbol. It never seems important enough: One week there are missiles, another week there’s a government coup, but in the end we don’t talk about Chikli.
This is exactly what normalization looks like: People shrug, look away, repress, grow accustomed, and then one fine day a guy looks around and sees that he’s surrounded by Chiklis. That his government is filled with them. Maybe it’s actually a Chikli government, not a Netanyahu government. Even though they’re basically the same thing.
There’s a good reason Benjamin Netanyahu once turned to right-wing politicians and cried out: “Be Chikli!” But that’s Netanyahu, so the command should of course be the exact opposite.
Chikli frequently tweets toxically about Aharon Barak, the former Supreme Court president, and Ehud Barak, the former prime minister, as though he were the last of the bots or mouthpieces, a loyal soldier of Yair Netanyahu.
I knew Chikli before he entered politics. I look at him and simply can’t believe what he’s become. He proves that the 2018 Nahal Tzafit disaster, in........
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