From Donald Trump to Israel and Europe, Why This Lurch to the Right?
Jay Michaelson, The Forward
To quote Donald Trump, “What the hell is going on?”
The global rise of right-wing populism — in the United States, across Europe and now in Israel — is clearly the leading news story of 2016.
Each week, Trump says something outrageous that hasn’t been said by a mainstream politician in half a century. And each week, his standing in the polls rises.
The trend is global. In Europe, the far right is growing in Hungary, Greece, France, the United Kingdom, and Austria, where the far-right Freedom Party came within a hair’s breadth of winning the presidency.
A right-wing populist is now president of the Philippines. A right-wing legislative coup has taken place in Brazil, where a creationist is now minister of science and the Cabinet is all white men.
And of course, the “second” President Putin has, since 2012, headed a revanchist Russian populist nationalist regime that has started wars, cracked down on dissidents of all types and renewed fears of a nuclear arms race.
And now Israel. Just a few weeks ago, it was unimaginable that the openly racist, nationalist Avigdor Lieberman would ever again hold a government post. He was too far right , even for the right.
Now, he’s got not just any post, but minister of defense, a job for which he is completely unqualified …
