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Situation Assessment 12 October, 2011

Analyzing the Israeli Protest Movement from a Political Economy Perspective

Keyword

The aim of this paper is to examine the sources of the current protest movement in Israel, its causes, and its relations with the shifts in Israeli economic policy over the last two decades. The protest movement came as somewhat of a surprise upon the current Israeli scene; on the one hand, neither the general economic conditions, the particular economic disparities, the changes in economic policies, nor the country's tax policies constituted a reason for a political or social protest movement over the last three decades. On the other hand, the unconventional nature of the current protests has emerged in their identity and geography, given that they have sprung from the middle classes of Western-Ashkenazi origins, and from the economic core of Israel as a result of the transformations in the state's economic policies. It has so far been clear that the demands of the protest movement are limited to the introduction of reforms to Israel's economic regime and the restoration of several social fields of employment to which the state had cut funding and entrusted to the private sector. In other words, the protest movement and the current actions seek to push the current economic and social regime to a new equilibrium point between the market economy and the social economy, an equilibrium that meets the needs of the Israeli society, the Israeli state, and even the Zionist project. The protest movement does not reflect a situation of conflict or crisis that is new to the Zionist project that has always shown pragmatism in its approach to economic matters, always finding a suitable balance the ultimately serves the Zionist project and its goals.

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