EHUD Olmert has become the prime minister of Israel. No longer just a “Deputy Prime Minister”, but now a real one. One hundred days after Ariel Sharon sank into a coma, the job and the title were taken away from him, as the law demands. Olmert is now the acting prime minister of the transitional government, and in a few weeks hence, with the establishment of the new coalition, he will become the head of a regular government.
All this is happening without any real debate about Olmert. The man, who has been a public figure all his life, is really unknown to most citizens. For the public, it suffices that he is the “Heir of Sharon”.
Yet it is difficult to imagine a bigger difference between two people than that between Sharon and Olmert. It’s the difference between a lion and a fox, between the king of the animals and the most cunning (according to the fables). Sharon is an extraordinary person, an adventurer, a leader of armies, a man of war, the originator of grandiose designs (generally with weak foundations), a creative, strong, dangerous and charismatic leader. Olmert is a politician is a politician is a politician.
The perfect description of a politician was written more than two thousand years ago, about a person who lived (according to legend) almost a thousand years before that: Abimelech king of Shechem (today’s Nablus).
As described in the Book of Judges (Chapter 9), Abimelech was the son of a great leader. After the death of his father, he killed his 70 brothers “upon one stone” and became dictator.
Only Jotham, the youngest brother, escaped the massacre. He came and stood on the top of Mount Gerizim, which overlooks the city, and recited to the men of Shechem in beautiful Hebrew an immortal fable, that starts with the words: “The trees went forth to anoint a king over them...”
They approached their fellow trees, one after another, and offered them the crown. When they came to the olive tree, it refused the offer with contempt: “Shall I leave my fatness, wherewith by me they honor God and man, and go to be promoted over the trees?” The proud fig tree, too, declined: “Should I forsake my sweetness, and my good fruit, and go to be promoted over the trees?”
And so, each in its turn, the trees preferred to do useful things rather than going into politics. Only the bramble, which has no fruit, no fragrance and no shadow, agreed to rule, on one condition: “If in truth ye anoint me king over you, then come and put your trust in my shadow — and if not, let fire come out of the bramble and devour the cedars of Lebanon.”
The biblical storyteller meant that the ordinary politician is a useless fellow, and everyone who has a creative talent should stay away from this profession. That is now a widespread view in Israel and the world at large. But that suggests a simple question: If so, who will do the job? Because politics is a necessary profession — somebody has to attain wide agreement for fulfilling tasks, enact laws and administer society. And if the olive and the fig trees do not deign to volunteer for the job, it is left to the bramble. That’s to say, one whose most outstanding trait is the hunger for power.
As is known from his biography, Olmert suffered in his childhood from much deprivation. A group of old-time Revisionists (members of the most right-wing Zionist movement, the antecedent of the Herut party), built themselves a neighborhood on the edge of Binyamina, south of Haifa, whose veteran inhabitants treated them with contempt. This may be what instilled in the boy Ehud the urge to stand out, to attain public recognition and also to get rich.
I met him first in the 1960s, when I was a member of the Knesset. The young Olmert was the apprentice and servant (literally) of another Member: Shmuel Tamir.
One could learn a lot from Tamir. He was a talented egomaniac, who believed that providence had marked him from birth to be prime minister. He had a gift for attracting people, turning them into his devoted slaves, using them as much as possible and then throwing them away like squeezed lemons. He had much personal charm and was a genius in public relations. There was always a bunch of journalists ready to serve him. Almost all of them later became his enemies. His political life was a crazy zigzag between various parties, splits and unions, dovish and hawkish positions, until he reached the post of Minister of Justice and got no further. On the way he also succeeded in getting rich.
That was the example that Olmert had before his eyes when he started his political career. His path looks like a river that snakes its way left and right, and sometimes back, but does not rest for a moment in its quest to reach the sea — supreme power. It may have taken decades, but now he has arrived.
Tamir, a former member of the Irgun, started his political career in the Herut party, left it, joined it again, tried to unseat Menachem Begin, failed, and was compelled to leave. So he set up a small party called the “Free Center”. Olmert, a Revisionist from birth, believed that Tamir, who was much younger than Begin, was more promising, and joined his unsuccessful rebellion. He found himself a junior functionary in a small party.
Tamir promoted the youngster. Too late did he understand that his pupil was more talented than he had bargained for: He did unto Tamir what Tamir had done unto Begin. He caused a split between Tamir and his partner, the veteran right-wing politician Eliezer Shostak, left the party and founded another one with Shostak. Then he overthrew Shostak and took over the leadership of the splinter group himself. The affair caused some smiles when Olmert (literally) ran away with the party’s rubber stamp in order to take it over.
When Olmert decided to enter the Knesset again, the 3,000 members of the willful Likud Central Committee bounced him back almost to square one: No. 32 on the election list. But Sharon, now leader of the party, decided that is was worthwhile to acquire the loyalty of this frustrated, ambitious politician. When he set up his government, he tried to hand him the powerful Finance Ministry. This proved impossible, because Netanyahu, No. 2 on the list, could not be pushed away.
The solution was to give Olmert a second-rank ministry, Industry and Trade, coupled with a consolation prize: The prestigious but empty title of “Deputy Prime Minister”. The sole prerogative of the holder of this title was to preside over Cabinet meetings when the Prime Minister was abroad. Sharon did not travel much.
And then two things happened: Sharon, spurred on by Olmert, split the Likud, and then sank into a coma. The “Deputy” became quite naturally his temporary heir, and the temporary heir became his permanent successor. After forty years of snaking around, the river had reached the sea.
How will Olmert develop as prime minister? Will the fox turn into a lion, the mere-politician into a statesman?
The first steps do not bode well. He has been playing the arrogant leader, especially vis-à-vis the Labor Party, his indispensable coalition partner. He is trying to include in his Cabinet the racist party of Avigdor Lieberman, treats Mahmoud Abbas with open contempt, boycotts the elected Palestinian leadership and allows Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz free rein to shell and starve the Palestinians.
It is too early to foresee where he will go. History has known small politicians who stepped out of the shadow of great leaders and surprised the world. It has been said that a politician thinks about the next elections, a statesman about the next generation.
