While proponents assert that the spread of democracy is essential to peace, two allied democracies, the United States and Israel, are engaged in wars being exacerbated by their electoral politics..

 

From the beginning, in the American mind, democracy has been seen as more than just a form of governance. Both Liberals and Conservatives idealize and elevate the idea of democracy into the equivalent of religious doctrine, making exaggerated claims about the benefits that accrue to democratic societies. We have been told that democratically elected governments are: more tolerant, more respectful of minority rights, more accountable for their actions, and less likely to start wars. Several US administrations have made the spread of democracy a foreign policy priority, arguing that it’s essential for world peace.

 

While the US and some allies flaunt these attributes, boasting that their democracies place them above societies with other forms of governance, in reality, their claims of purity and adherence to ideals don’t hold up to scrutiny.

 

The glaring contradiction between the values espoused and the actual behaviors have been clear since our founding. After all, the American experiment with democracy was built on slave labor and the genocide of Native Americans. More recently, when the George W. Bush administration launched its campaign to promote democracies worldwide, it did so while blundering through a devastating “war of choice” in Iraq and torturing prisoners in “black sites” they’d suborned other countries to make available to US interrogators.

 

Much the same can be said of Israel, who we and they tout as “our closest ally” and the “only democracy in the Middle East.” Like us, Israel claims that its democracy elevates it above its neighbors, making its actions more just and its behavior more moral. And like true believers in any ideology, when it’s pointed out that reality doesn’t agree with their claims, they deny it and attack those pointing out the disconnect.

 

The fact that democracies hold elections provides yet another reason to boast of superiority. However, elections are often used by contesting parties to justify bad behaviors and exacerbate social tensions.

 

President Trump, for example, needs a way out of his no-win war with Iran, especially its negative impact on the economy and consumers, and the insecurity and instability it is fomenting in the Gulf. But he is loath to look weak by ending the war without some claim of victory. That might have a negative impact on his legacy and his hold over his base voters—and he needs them to turn out in November to deliver a GOP victory. And so, he continues his bellicose language and threats toward Iran.

 

Israel’s Prime Minister Netanyahu may have assumed that he could manage a governing coalition of parties even more extreme than his own. But his partners have used their positions to aggravate tensions with Palestinians in both Israel and the occupied lands. When Netanyahu felt compelled to sign onto ceasefires that were supposed to stop the bombing in Gaza and Lebanon, his agreement proved hollow. In the face of criticism from opponents and even coalition partners that he was compromising Israel’s security by not “finishing the job,” he has continued to violate both ceasefires with impunity, while doing nothing

 

to rein in the widespread terrorist violence in the West Bank being fomented by his allies. He cannot afford to lose any of his governing partners, or he’ll be out of office.

 

In both instances, instead of implementing the values claimed to be the attributes of democracy, these

 

elections do the opposite. Political discourse becomes coarser and more divisive, social tensions are aggravated, and warlike behaviors are promoted.

 

Especially troubling is that while reporters and commentators know that the words and actions of Netanyahu and Trump are directed more at appeasing their constituents than at the realities in Gaza, Lebanon, or Iran, too often they treat the political posturing as if it were real. For example, instead of honestly assessing Netanyahu’s claims that villages in south Lebanon need to be demolished to fend off his opponents’ accusations of weakness, they report it as if leveling whole Lebanese villages is needed for Israel’s security.

 

Sadly, this is what has become of our democracies.

 

 

The writer is president of the Washington-based Arab American Institute