Israel's Far-Left is a national security threat.

By co-opting the hostage cause, amplifying enemy propaganda, and undermining unity in wartime, Israel’s Far-Left is weakening the country from within.

Yair Golan (center), a Far-Left Israeli politician, recently accused Israel of killing babies in Gaza “as a hobby.” (photo: Yair Golan/X)

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Four months before October 7, 2023, I booked a ticket from Tel Aviv to Amsterdam to visit my Israeli cousins who had relocated to Holland several years ago. The departure date was October 13th.

Then October 7th happened.

I still ended up taking that flight, partly because my Tel Aviv apartment building had no bomb shelter or safe room. In the days after the attack, with rockets falling non-stop, it made sense to leave the country temporarily.

The flight was delayed by one day because of the war, so I arrived in Holland on October 14th. When I walked into my cousins’ home, the conversation — like every conversation among Israelis, anywhere on earth — revolved entirely around October 7th and its then-one-week aftermath.

One branch of our family in Israel is very Far-Left, the type that proudly says, “I’m not Jewish, I’m just Israeli” (even though they are, technically, Jewish). But these cousins in Holland are closer to the political center.

Over a glass of wine, I told my cousins what I feared: not that Hamas or its allies would destroy our country, but that the Far-Left in Israel would soon use the war to undermine our state and our military. That they would turn an existential war against Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, Hezbollah, the Houthis, and ultimately Iran into a political weapon against their fellow Israelis. Unfortunately, I couldn’t have been more right.

After a few weeks of “unity” lip service from the Far-Left, “protests for the hostages” have become a regular fixture in Tel Aviv and other parts of the country. At first glance, they appear to be humanitarian rallies calling for the safe return of Israelis held by Hamas in Gaza.

But if you actually go, you’ll see that the hostage cause has been hijacked. Yes, there are signs and speeches about the hostages — but woven into the banners, chants, and megaphone tirades are entirely unrelated demands: calls for Right-wing politicians to be jailed, inflammatory accusations against the government, and baseless claims about Israel’s conduct in the war.

To add insult to injury, these Far-Left fanatics bring Israeli flags to these protests to make it seem like they appreciate our Jewish state, all the while advocating for policies and concessions that would dismantle it from within. The flag becomes a prop, a shield against criticism, as they demand measures that would empower Hamas, weaken Israel’s deterrence, and make the survival of a sovereign Jewish homeland far less certain. It’s a performance of patriotism in service of a platform that erodes the very foundations of the country they claim to defend.

Let’s be honest: They aren’t about uniting the country behind a shared tragedy; they’re about exploiting the hostages as a political cudgel. The unspoken message is clear: If you don’t show up to these rallies, or if you don’t agree to Israel effectively issuing Hamas a blank check by ending the war immediately in exchange for the hostages, you “don’t care” about the hostages.

It’s manipulative. It’s dishonest. And it’s dangerous — because it pressures everyday Israelis and the government to make decisions based not on security realities, but on the emotional blackmail of a politicized street movement.

Anyone who genuinely cares about the hostages should be directing their outrage squarely at the people holding them — Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad — and demanding their immediate, unconditional release. These are innocent men, women, and children abducted from their homes, tortured, and paraded as bargaining chips. Every day they remain in captivity is a direct result of Palestinians’ deliberate choice to use human beings as human shields and negotiating tools.

To turn that horror into a political weapon against the Israeli government is not advocacy; it’s moral misdirection that rewards the very tactic which put the hostages in danger in the first place. It signals to every terror group in the region that kidnapping Israelis works, that it will fracture our society, erode our resolve, and divide our politics. True solidarity with the hostages means keeping the focus where it belongs: on the terrorists who hold them, not on scoring political points in time for the next election.

Of course, this isn’t the first time Israel has faced an existential threat. In 1948, during the War of Independence, the country’s political factions — bitter rivals in normal times — came together to form a united front. The same happened before the Six-Day War in 1967, when a national unity government was created to strengthen the country’s resolve. Those moments of solidarity were decisive in ensuring Israel’s survival.

Today’s Far-Left is doing the opposite. Instead of rallying behind the defense of the state, they are importing internal political battles into wartime, weakening our ability to face an enemy that thrives on our division.

Before anyone dismisses this as the ranting of a Benjamin Netanyahu loyalist, let me be clear: I have voted in five Israeli elections since 2013, and never once for Netanyahu or his party, Likud. My votes have always gone to center or center-right parties. I believe in a strong, democratic Israel that protects minority rights, upholds the rule of law, and makes pragmatic security decisions — not one that is held hostage by either the extreme Right or the extreme Left.

But in this moment, it’s the Far-Left that is posing the bigger threat to national security, precisely because they cloak their politics in the language of morality, while undermining the country’s ability to defend itself in an existential war.

Anyone that knows Israel’s history knows that, for decades, Left-wing governments and coalitions ran the country. Did this make Israel more loved in the world? No. Did it make peace with our neighbors more achievable? No. In fact, under the 1990s Oslo Accords¹ process — a product of an Israeli Left-wing government — Israel handed over weapons and territory to a Palestinian Authority that quickly lost control to Hamas in Gaza. That policy mistake cost thousands of Israeli lives.

And internationally, Israel’s image wasn’t better under the Left. The same NGOs, United Nations committees, and foreign media outlets that demonize us today were doing it back then too. The idea that electing more Left-wing governments will somehow buy us goodwill from people who fundamentally oppose a Jewish state is a dangerous fantasy.

If the political stunts weren’t bad enough, some Far-Left leaders have crossed into outright defamation of their own country in wartime. Just recently, Yair Golan — a fringe politician scrambling for relevance among his tiny extremist base — accused Israel of killing babies in Gaza “as a hobby.” This is the kind of blood libel language we expect from Hamas propaganda, not from a former IDF general.

Not to be outdone, former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert (a convicted felon who served nearly 17 months in prison for bribery, obstruction of justice, and breach of trust) declared that Israel’s actions in Gaza are “very close to a war crime.”

And now, in a public letter signed by Israeli “activists” and “intellectuals,” we are told: “Our country is starving the people of Gaza to death and contemplating the forced removal of millions of Palestinians from the Strip. We, Israelis dedicated to a peaceful future for our country and our Palestinian neighbors, write this with grave shame, in rage and in agony.”²

These are not careful policy critiques. They are sweeping, incendiary accusations with no factual basis, delivered to a global audience in the middle of a war, while handing our enemies a propaganda goldmine to use in international forums and legal proceedings against Israeli soldiers.

Groups like Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Iranian regime actively work to break Israel’s morale from within. They know they cannot destroy Israel purely through military means, so they wage psychological warfare — feeding narratives that erode national unity and trust in our leadership. When Israeli politicians or activists repeat enemy talking points, they don’t just “voice dissent”; they amplify the enemy’s playbook.

This is why the Far-Left’s rhetoric is more than political disagreement; it becomes a tool of our enemies, handed to them for free.

Like many other extreme leftist movements across the world, Israel’s Far-Left positions itself as the moral conscience of Israel — speaking of “human rights,” “international law,” and “compassion” — but applies these principles selectively. They rage against alleged Israeli wrongs while remaining silent on Hamas’ deliberate targeting of civilians, the atrocities of October 7th, and the oppression of women and LGBTQ people under Palestinian rule.

This selective outrage is not principled; it’s political. And when morality is used as a weapon instead of a standard, it becomes a justification for weakening the very society it claims to protect.

By insisting that Israel stop the war immediately to secure the release of hostages — without addressing the long-term threat posed by Hamas and other terror groups in our neighborhood — the Far-Left is creating a dangerous precedent: kidnapping works. Every terrorist group in the region is watching and learning that abducting Israelis leads to political and military concessions. Far from saving future lives, this approach makes the next hostage crisis more likely.

Also, the world has changed: What is said inside Israel no longer stays inside Israel. When Yair Golan or Ehud Olmert make reckless accusations, their words are quickly cited in the International Court of Justice, the UN Human Rights Council, and global media as proof of Israeli guilt. These statements can lead to sanctions, boycotts, and arms embargoes, weakening Israel’s ability to defend itself. In other words, the Far-Left’s domestic rhetoric can have real, measurable consequences for Israel’s foreign policy and military readiness.

There is a clear difference between constructive criticism and sabotage. Criticism, when based on facts and voiced in the right forums, strengthens democracy and can even improve security policy. But publicly smearing Israel during wartime with enemy-inspired accusations is not dissent; it’s sabotage. The Far-Left’s failure to recognize this distinction is part of why they have become such a liability in this moment.

National security isn’t only about tanks, jets, and Iron Dome batteries. It’s also about national morale, diplomatic leverage, and the ability to present a united front to the world. When prominent Israelis publicly accuse their own country of committing atrocities without evidence, it emboldens our enemies and weakens our alliances.

Calling out the Far-Left’s excesses does not mean giving a free pass to Israel’s Far-Right. Both ends of the spectrum have their extremists, and both can cause damage. A mature, serious democracy should be able to hold a nuanced conversation that rejects all forms of political fanaticism, not just the ones on the “other” side.

The difference is that accountability has to start at home. You cannot parade your own extremism in the streets, undermine national security, and then act shocked when someone points it out — all while condemning your political opponents for doing the very same thing. Hypocrisy is not a political strategy; it’s a credibility killer.

If we are going to demand responsibility from the Far-Right, then the Far-Left must live by the same standard.

Israel has been fighting for its survival on multiple fronts — in Gaza, in the north against Hezbollah in Lebanon, in the Red Sea against Houthis attacks from Yemen, in the West Bank against Hamas-inspired and other Palestinian terror groups, against Iran, and in the international arena. But the most insidious battle may be the one happening inside our own society. If we allow political opportunists to turn wartime into a stage for ideological crusades, if we normalize the slander of our soldiers and our cause, we will hand our enemies the victory they could never win on the battlefield.

You can oppose the Far-Right without excusing the Far-Left. You can debate policy without sabotaging the war effort. You can demand a better future without tearing down the very country that will have to build it.

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1. A pair of agreements signed in 1993 and 1995 between Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization, aiming to achieve a two-state solution and resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict through a phased approach

2. “‘Every home in Gaza is filled with antisemitic propaganda’: Fauda star slams anti-war petition.” The Jerusalem Post.