Yesterday, the Knesset passed a law requiring that any peace agreement under which Israel will relinquish territory in the Golan or Jerusalem must be put to a referendum of Israel’s citizens.

We expected that critics of Israel – who don’t much care that the Jewish State is the only democracy in the region – would find fault with this measure.

But more surprising – disappointing actually – is that in Israel, Opposition/Kadima party leader Tzippy Livni and Labor party leader Ehud Barak also seem to believe that the Israeli people are neither responsible nor intelligent enough to pass on a potential deal that implicates Israel’s security and identity interests.

Israel, in many ways, is quite different from the United States of course – but this is the sort of arrogance that yields a Tea Party. What would it be called in Israel – Mifleget Wissotzky?

Posted by Nathan J. Diament