As usual in the weeks before a national election, colorful campaign ads are proliferating in Israel. One that has managed to generate some attention, even outside the Jewish state, was produced by the campaign of the current justice minister Ayelet Shaked. Spoofing an advertisement for high-end perfume, the short video mocks those who have branded as fascist both her and her platform, which focuses mainly on reforms of the judiciary. Vivian Bercovici notes that many have failed to get the joke, and are now wringing their hands over an Israeli politician’s supposed disregard for democracy:

Timed to coincide with the Jewish holiday of Purim, on which it is customary to get all silly (as Jews celebrate their triumph over the ancient Persian attempt to destroy them), Shaked presented the ad spot as a wickedly funny and ironic jab at her critics. The problem was that people outside Israel who do not understand Hebrew, or Jewish culture, used it as proof of the wicked ways of the right—and Israel in general. . . .

What Shaked disparages as excessive judicial activism her nemeses see as evidence that the judiciary is doing its job; ensuring that elected officials do not run amok. Democracy needs tending, and the role of the judiciary is to pen in overly-zealous legislators. It is an evergreen debate that persists in most democracies, but it has been particularly sharp in Israel in recent years. . . .

In response to the hue and cry Shaked’s political ad inspired in Israel and abroad, she says that the left can’t take a joke. “It is a nice clip aimed at the liberal left that has for years called me a fascist but keeps losing the elections.” . . .

If nothing else, Israeli election campaigns are endlessly entertaining. A pox on the sourpusses who can’t take a joke.

Examining the Trump administration’s proposals for the people of Gaza, Danielle Pletka writes:

I do not believe that the forced cleansing of Gaza—a repetition of what every Arab country did to the hundreds of thousands of Arab Jews in 1948— is a “solution.” I don’t think Donald Trump views that as a permanent solution either (read his statement), though I could be wrong. My take is that he believes Gaza must be rebuilt under new management, with only those who wish to live there resettling the land.

The time has long since come for us to recognize that the establishment doesn’t have the faintest clue what to do about Gaza. Egypt doesn’t want it. Jordan doesn’t want it. Iran wants it, but only as cannon fodder. The UN wants it, but only to further its anti-Semitic agenda and continue milking cash from the West. Jordanians, Lebanese, and Syrians blame Palestinians for destroying their countries.

Negotiations with Hamas have not worked. Efforts to subsume Gaza under the Palestinian Authority have not worked. Rebuilding has not worked. Destruction will not work. A “two-state solution” has not arrived, and will not work.

So what’s to be done? If you live in Washington, New York, London, Paris, or Berlin, your view is that the same answers should definitely be tried again, but this time we mean it. This time will be different. . . . What could possibly make you believe this other than ideological laziness?