As Channel 12 News prepares its second installment of the Days of Binyamin series, Arutz Sheva spoke to Amit Segal, editor and presenter of the series.
"Human memory is prone to forgetfulness and easy to manipulate and many things are forgotten when they don't fit the narrative," said Segal, who says archival revelation reveals details that are hard to believe about Netanyahu.
"I was surprised at how much Netanyahu was initially perceived as someone cold and artificial who did not evoke any emotion from others, kind of like Nir Barkat. In stands in contrast to the boiling anger they experience today when they say the name Binyamin Netanyahu. The second thing is how dramatic the Oslo days and Rabin's murder were." That period will be covered in the second episode, 'Is he an ideologue or an opportunist,' which will air Monday night.
"We will see all the evidence. My conclusion is that he is much more of an ideologue than an opportunist. Momo Philber, then his assistant and vice president of the Yesha Council,defined it nicely when he quoted Netanyahu saying," You zigzag and zigzag until you get where you want." When you look at things twenty-five years back, it turns out that despite the Shalit deal that Segal opposed and despite the disengagement that was not from Netanyahu's courage, at the end of Netanyahu's day, he helped to stifle the Palestinian national idea," Segal stated.
In his view, most of Netanyahu's predictions have come true. When he talked about rockets from Gaza, when he declared that Oslo would fail, and when he talked about the danger of withdrawals. "Most of the ideological right-wing predicted it, but Netanyahu is not a settler and the landowners of the Land of Israel did not do it to him. His projections and his ability to market them are the most significant."
Segal believes that most of Netanyahu's years have been based on the national security element and less on the ideology of the Land of Israel in the terms of leaders of Judea and Samaria, but with the Palestinian Authority partner the result is the same. If Swedes had replaced the Palestinian Arabs, he believes the result could have been very different.
"The construction freeze and even the Hevron Wye agreement were tactical events, even if they caused a lot of stomach pain," he explained.
On Netanyahu's relationship with religious Zionism, Segal says that politics is not based on gratitude. "For the most part, religious Zionism did not support or vote for Netanyahu, but for parties that sat in a coalition with Netanyahu and did not go with the Blue and White party or Labor in March, and so these discussions are fascinating in the academic but practical terms, although no figure in religious Zionism has affected Likud voters in Ashkelon or Ashdod. Modesty will not hurt. The debate will not decide the fate of the state."
"I don't think Netanyahu's ideology has changed over the years since his first foot in the Likud," said Segal, who believes that not only Netanyahu, but everyone who heads the state's leadership believes that the good of the state is its own good and vice versa. "They see themselves as the country's biggest asset. So it was with Ben-Gurion, so for Begin and so for others. It will be no different with Netanyahu and no change in this issue is expected."
"There is something unfortunate in that Netanyahu is making the necessary changes to the justice system only when he faced a head-on collision with the justice system. It would have been better if he had gone over these things a decade ago. He could have done so."