Page 15 - Issue 14

infrastructure – without acknowledging that the
resources they were squandering from the state
could, in a situation like this, ultimately be
responsible for withholding them from the world
which makes the economy possible. This must
stop. For the economy to have meaning, it needs a
world. And this world can only be built collectively,
by the joint efforts of corporations and the state.
While only states can manage a crisis of such scale,
they will not be strong enough to get out of the
crisis alone: Corporations will need to contribute
to the maintenance of the public goods from
which they have taken so much benefit.

Public fear always puts institutions in danger (the
political monsters of the 20th century all used fear
to strip democracy of its institutions). In Israel,
despite the relatively low toll in human lives (so
far), the coronavirus crisis has exerted a profound
shock on its governing institutions.

As writer-activist Naomi Klein has relentlessly
argued, catastrophes are often opportunities for
elites to grab bounties and exploit them. Israel
provides a striking example. Netanyahu has de
facto suspended basic civil rights, closed down the
Israeli courts (postponing for at least two months
his own criminal trial). On March 16, the
government approved the use of technological
tools developed by the Shin Bet security service
for tracking suspected terrorists for following the
movements of virus carriers. It circumvented
approval of the Knesset in the process and took