Israel: Why I'm not voting today . . .

Even though I've voted in every Israeli election since 1985 (that I was able to), I will not be voting today. Here's why. 

During the last 2.5 years, the government has enacted emergency laws that gave it the power to restrict our liberties in nearly any way they wanted. The government used these powers to institute house arrest, euphemistically called “lockdowns".  Government lockdowns resulted in thousands of businesses being wiped out. Most of these were small- to medium-size family businesses that were built over a lifetime if not intergenerational. In short, lives were destroyed.

Government lockdowns meant that schools were closed for most of the past 2.5 years.  Children have essentially lost 2 years of schooling.  One awful result, among others, is that there is a psychiatric epidemic in Israel.

In addition to lockdowns, people have been coerced through campaigns of intimidation and fear mongering into taking the experimental shot that has caused so much damage to so many, and who knows what lies in store for the future. Those who refused to comply were forced out of their jobs. To this day, health workers in Israel are mandated to get vaccinated.  If they don't, they cannot work even though, it has been known for over a year that the COVID vaccines do not prevent virus transmission.

That sentence is worth repeating.  The world has known for more than a year that COVID vaccines do not prevent transmission of SARS-CoV2.

The all-cause death rate in Israel in 2022 is leaps and bounds in excess of the five-year rolling average.

Of all the members of the Knesset, all 120 of them, only one, Gadi Yivarkan (Likud) has spoken out forcefully and in public against these unprecedented restrictions of individual liberties.  He was thrown out of a Knesset committee for his troubles.  Even so, he has not called for free and open debate regarding the shots themselves.

Incredibly, the curtailment of individual liberties has not even been an issue in the political debate leading up to the elections. The only thing that's seems to be important is whether you're for Bibi (Netanyahu) or against Bibi. How ridiculous is that?!

In the United States, by contrast, the lockdowns and mandates figured prominently in the political debate leading up to the midterms.  Unfortunately, Israel which was founded by socialists, does not have the culture of individual freedom that is embedded in the United States Constitution and is part of the DNA of every American.

A search on the internet for the purpose of government will yield many different results.  However, I think we can all agree that the primary purpose of government is to guarantee individuals freedom from outside interference. James Madison, one of the prime architects of the U.S. Constitution, wrote in Federalist Papers No. 10 (1787) that securing individual rights (he called it “the faculties of men") is ”the first object of government".  

The Israeli government, the entire Knesset, and the Israeli judiciary have failed miserably at this.

Governments require our participation to give them legitimacy.  Voting is a key way of participating.  This is the reason dictatorships mandate voting. It lends at least the veneer if not the substance of legitimacy to the dictator.  

In countries where voting is not mandated such as Israel, by voting the citizen is making a statement: “The government is legitimate. By voting I am participating in a democratic process whose purpose is to elect those who will represent me and my interests in the government.”

But what if the government does whatever it wants once in power?  What if the entire government and all its institutions are against guaranteeing me my personal liberties? What if the purpose of the government is to maintain its own power?  Is that government legitimate?  Is the system that facilitates this form of government legitimate?

By voting in this situation, you are participating in an illusion that there is a democratic process; that you are making your voice heard; that those for whom you vote will represent your interests; that the government is in place to protect your liberties.  

In reality, voting in an illegitimate system grants it legitimacy. Voting is acquiescence to the powers that be.  It is a form of control.  It is a way for those in power to keep the governed at bay and to maintain power.  It is a lie.

America's Frontline News Director Mordechai Sones said, “We are stepping away from this chessboard because the other side has jettisoned the rules long ago. . . . By participating in elections, you support the very system that imprisons you."

He continued: "By not voting, you reject the principle that the majority may, by right, tyrannize the minority.

"Officials pretend that the fact that people voted for them is tantamount to a ‘mandate’. But as Robert LeFevre wrote in Abstain from Beans: 'When we express a preference politically, we do so precisely because we intend to bind others to our will. Political voting is the legal method we have adopted and extolled for obtaining monopolies of power.

"'Political voting is nothing more than the assumption that might makes right. It is a presumption that any decision wanted by the majority of those expressing a preference must be desirable, and the inference even goes so far as to presume that anyone who differs from the majority view is wrong - or possibly immoral.'”

I've decided that I am no longer willing to live the lie. Count me out.