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Opinion // Does Netanyahu ReallyBelieve in Democracy? Global FreedomExperts Aren't SureTunisia speeds past Israel’s ailing democracy, even before COVID-19. Netanyahu has‘anti-democratic tendencies.’ Hungary and Poland protect civil liberties better: How thebig three democracy indexes assess Israel

Mar 29, 2020 4:05 PM

Protesters, waving black flags, demonstrate against 'weakening Israel's democracy' under cover of the coronavirus crisis near the Knesset inJerusalem, March 23 2020 Credit: Ohad Zwigenberg

With the release of V-Dem’s democracy report last Friday, all the

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2020-04-06 13)27Does Netanyahu really believe in democracy? Global freedom experts aren't sure - Opinion - Haaretz.com

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three big democracy rating indexes have published their yearlyreports for 2020 (their data covers 2019). It is bleak reading – andthat does not count the likely even more negative fallout for theworld’s democracies that may emerge from the COVID-19 pandemicand the economic recession that will surely follow.

The three reports unanimously paint a picture of intensifyingautocratization around the world - from Brazil to India to the U.S. toEurope - with Hungary now being the first non-democratic MemberState of the EU.

According to V-Dem’s latest report, the majority or the world’sstates are no longer democracies and only 46 percent of the world’spopulation are now living in electoral and liberal democracies.Freedom House’s flagship publication, the "Freedom in the WorldReport for 2020," found that 2019 was the 14th consecutive year ofdecline in global freedom.

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All regime types were affected by this decline and more than half ofthe countries that were rated Free or Not Free in 2009 have suffereda net decline in the past decade, according to Freedom House. TheEconomist Democracy Index reported the worst average globalscore since the index was first produced in 2006.

So how did Israel fare in this dark hour for liberal democracy? Likelast year, Israel ‘s scores were a mixed bag; from again receiving itsworst rating ever from Freedom House, to receiving the same,relatively bad rating from V-Dem as it received last year, to againreceiving its best rating ever from The Economist Democracy Index.The discrepancies can be explained by looking at the various ratingindexes measurements and methodologies, which all rely on expertcoding.

Freedom House, the most well-known of the big three ratingindexes, gave Israel its worst rating ever since its flagshippublication the Freedom in the World began in 1973. FreedomHouse lowered Israel’s aggregated score from 78/100 last year to76/100 this year.

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Freedom House rating for Israel, 2019 Credit: Twitter

The decline in Israel’s rating took place in the category "Functioningof Government" because the two successive elections in 2019 (plusone this year) failed to produce a new government, leaving theexisting government in place as a caretaker. Israel’s rating was alsodowngraded because caretaker Prime Minister BenjaminNetanyahu, who was indicted on multiple corruption charges in2019, refused to step down and instead ran for reelection, whileattacking the credibility of law enforcement institutions.

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The Freedom in the World 2020 report noted that "Israel’s scorehas slipped six points, an unusually large decline for an establisheddemocracy." In fact, since 2011, Freedom House’s reports havewarned about successive anti-democratic laws that were advancedor enacted in the Israeli parliament.

The latest report also came down hard on Netanyahu personally byaccusing him of having "anti-democratic tendencies." These ant-idemocratic tendencies were laid bare for all to see in the past weekwhen Netanyahu and his Likud party managed to postpone his trialand frantically tried to suspend the Israeli parliament from properlyfunctioning in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic.

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All of this, of course, raises serious questions: Are the Likud partyand the (caretaker) prime minister really true democrats?

V-Dem, the most academic of the three rating indexes, ranksIsrael as holding the 49th place out of 179 countries on its LiberalDemocracy Index. Israel’s score was marginally improved comparedto last year, but what was most surprising about this year’s reportwas that Tunisia made a great leap forward to placing itself 41 out of179 on the Liberal Democracy Index. This means that Tunisia nowranks as the most liberal and democratic country in the Middle Easton V-Dem’s ranking, seven places in front of Israel; Kuwait(106/179) is the region’s distant third.

A somewhat different picture emerges, as usual, from TheEconomist Democracy Index, which historically has ranked Israelhigher than the other two indexes. Israel is well ahead of Tunisia onboth The Economist’s and Freedom House’s indexes. This yearIsrael is ranked 28 out of 167, and it actually received its bestaggregated score ever in this year’s index from The Economist.

How The Economist has rated Israel's democracy 2006-2019 Credit: Anders Persson

V-Dem Institute@vdeminstitute

@vdeminstitute #dataset & #DemocracyReport are out! It shows that #autocratization accelerates in the #world: #autocracies are now in the majority: covering 92 countries & 54% of the world population. Dataset: bit.ly/2vA818D Democracy Report: bit.ly/2weDL3K

113 11:31 AM - Mar 20, 2020

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The reason for this is that Israel improved, somewhat paradoxicallyin this author’s opinion, in the category "Functioning ofGovernment," despite the fact that Israel has not had a functioninggovernment for the past year. Also, worth noting is that Israel scoreslow in the "Civil Liberties" category, which is a common theme in allthe three indexes. In The Economist Democracy Index, Israel’s CivilLiberties score is exactly the same as Tunisia, but far lower than allthe EU Member States, even including Hungary and Poland.

Just like Netanyahu is widely considered, in the words of FreedomHouse’s report, to be "at the vanguard of nationalistic andchauvinistic populism," he may turn out to be at the vanguard ofmanipulating the COVID-19 pandemic to prolong his stay in officeas well. Leading democracy experts are currently warning thatthe COVID-19 pandemicis a golden opportunity for would beautocrats to consolidate their hold on power by imposingrestrictions on their societies. Some of them are already pointingfingers at Netanyahu.

As for the threats to Israel’s democracy, the internal data from Israelcan be read in two ways. One is negative, where there is anincreasing fear that Israel’s democracy is in grave danger. Accordingto data from the Israel Democracy Institute, the total number ofIsraelis who felt "very much" that their country’s democracy is ingrave danger rose by almost 50 percent from 22.5 percent of thetotal population in 2018 to 32 percent of the population in 2019.

A staggering 84.5 percent of Israeli Jews defined as left-wing, 68percent of those in the center, while just 29 percent of those to theright agree (very much or quite a lot) that Israeli democracy is ingrave danger.

A protest outside the Israeli parliament in Jerusalem against the 'assault on democracy', Thursday, March 19,2020. Credit: Eyal Warshavsky,AP

On the other hand, Israel has just gone through three highlycontested, free and fair elections in less than year, with increasingturnouts in the last two, especially among the Arab minority. All ofthis must be seen as evidence of the strength of Israel’s democraticcharacter. The support among Israelis for key institutions such as

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the Supreme Court is still almost four times higher than for thepolitical parties, according to the Israel Democracy Institute.

Alongside the democratic decline and intensifying autocratization inthe world, all the three rating indexes reported massive upswingsfor popular protests across the world - from the Americas, to Africaand the Middle East, to Asia, to Europe and Russia. V-Dem writesthat 2019 was without a doubt the "year of global protests" with pro-democracy protests rising to an all-time high. FreedomHouse argues that the protests movements reflect "the inexhaustibleand universal desire for fundamental rights."

There can be little doubt that the present situation in Israel reflectsthese global trends, with pro-democracy protests outside theKnesset last week and this, alongside warnings from manyprominent commentators, including President Reuven Rivlin, thatIsrael’s democracy is under threat.

It is still too early to say how the present constitutional crisis inIsrael will play out – and how far the coronavirus crisis will pushlegal and political norms to their limits, or beyond them. But what iscertain is that while there are multiplying dangers for liberaldemocracy, there is still a substantial popular will to fight for it, inIsrael and around the world.

Anders Persson is a political scientist at Linnaeus University,Sweden, specializing in EU-Israel/Palestinerelations. Twitter: @82AndersPersson

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