Two Lessons From Israel
By
Leonard Zwelling
https://www.nytimes.com/live/2023/03/27/world/israel-protests-netanyahu
I am writing this when it is early evening in Tel Aviv on March 27. The right-wing, nationalist Israeli government has just decided to delay its proposed changes to the national judiciary that include parliamentary selection of judges and parliamentary override of judicial decisions. The Netanyahu government’s decision to delay is a major victory for the more moderate (and probably majority) Israelis who have been demonstrating for weeks against the proposed changes saying such changes would strikingly curtail Israeli democracy.
There are two lessons for me.
The first is that it is very important for a newish democracy like Israel to have a written constitution that defines who embodies the executive, legislative, and judicial power in the country. Israel does not have such a document allowing there to be a debate over exactly who controls the judiciary. If Netanyahu’s plan goes into effect, the entirety of the Israeli government will be in the hands of the Knesset, the legislature, the leader of which is the prime minister, the chief executive. This is bad. It basically ends protection for minority rights usually afforded by the courts.
Second, there is still power in the people. It is very clear that just as the United States is split red vs. blue, Israel is split approximately in half between those backing the new government (primarily the right-wing extremists, the nationalists, the ultra-religious, and the West Bank settlers) and those opposing it (the more traditional secular Israelis, the academics, and the business community that needs the protection of a fair judicial system).
What should we in the United States make of what is happening in Israel?
First, as we have seen time and again, the Founding Fathers were geniuses in the documentation of how the new government was to work in the late 18th century. It has saved us from the tyranny of bigots, racists, communists, and Nazis along with a host of other nefarious groups who would have seized power and trampled on various minorities. The most recent example was on January 6, 2021 when a sitting president tried to undermine the peaceful transition of power afforded by a fair election and was successfully rebuffed by the Constitution. We shall see if the judicial system makes him pay for this crime or from his sequestration of classified documents in Mar A Lago. Frankly, I could care less whether or not he paid Stormy Daniels with campaign money. That potential trial is nonsense. Who cares?
Second, the people still have power as they did in the 1960’s. Without protests there would have been no successful civil rights legislation and the Vietnam War would have gone on unopposed. What this means is that even with a written constitution, democracies need the people to protect the fragility of the system when the leaders of that system go astray.
The same is true in academia. The university systems, particularly the academic medical systems, are being buffeted by the forces of mandatory diversity and the need to drive clinicians to see more patients despite the inefficiencies those in charge have installed to lengthen the day of rank-and-file faculty.
As the readers of this space know, I have long advocated turning the clinic at MD Anderson to a Sunday on a selected Wednesday to create some awareness of the adverse conditions under which the clinical faculty has to work. At the same time, some reasonable ground rules for shared governance, which exist at the UT System level, need to be elucidated at the local level in Houston, too.
It is easy for a seemingly fair system to go off the rails without the guidance of a constitution and active participation by the governed. Israel may be leading the way in these regards, but they need not go it alone. Standard by-laws and an engaged populace can correct a lot of bad decisions from the top.
Dr. Zwelling’s new novel, Conflict of Interest: Money Drives Medicine and People Die is available at:
barnesandnoble.com,
on amazon if you search using the title and subtitle, and
directly from the publisher Dorrance at: https://bookstore.dorrancepublishing.com/conflict-of-interest-money-drives-medicine-and-people-die-pb/
