Judicial reform protests started with the 1990s 'music revolution' - opinion

Elul, the last month of the Jewish year, was marked with two mass-crowd events: The ascent of Israelis of all political and religious backgrounds to Jerusalem, and the intensifying of protests against the government’s judicial reform (or “revolution,” as dubbed by protesters).

What was the origin of this year’s protest? Many Israelis on both sides agree that it was not just the judicial reforms. Some point to the long reign of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu; others to built-up frustrations that the “1977 revolution,” as it is known in Israel – the victory of the Menachem Begin-led Likud, which ended decades of Labor Party rule – is not ending, notwithstanding episodic breaks.

Indeed, during those 46 years there were anti-government protests for various reasons: The Lebanon War in the early 1980s, alleged corruption in the early 1990s, cost-of-living increases in the early 2010s, and Netanyahu’s refusal to resign when he was indicted for corruption in 2020.

But perhaps it is the protest that did not happen that serves as a primary contributor to today’s situation: the “music revolution” of the 1990s.

Until then, Israeli radio would only play “proper” music, excluding Sephardi/Mizrahi Middle Eastern music. With nearly half of Israeli Jews of Sephardi heritage, the demand led to the emergence of the “cassette industry” centered around the Tel Aviv bus station. There, people could purchase Sephardi music that the radio stations weren’t playing.

In the decades that followed the “1977 revolution,” there were no significant changes to the composition of non-government centers of power such as the media, academia, judicial, and civil service. But there was one area in which there was a major change: music! Starting in the 1990s, radio stations began playing Sephardi singers such as Zohar Argov and Zehava Ben.

This, some argue, led to two developments: Middle Eastern Sephardim were not properly “Ashkenazied” (“Europeanized”), and Ashkenazim were influenced by Sephardi Middle Eastern music, along with its religious themes and alleged shallowness.

As one prominent and highly respected politician at that time reflected: “Instead of us conquering Tul Karem, Tul Karem conquered us” (referring to the Palestinian city; he later apologized).

Fast forward 30 years, and one can see today the consequences of the music revolution and the religious themes that accompanied it.

The music revolution: From the clubs to the synagogues

In 1982, the song of the year was Benzin’s “Friday” (“Yom Shishi”), in which the Israeli rock band described the week-long anticipation, day-by-day, to Friday night, when there is a party and “we stay all night till the next morning.”

By 2019, the theme of this song was adapted (or hijacked) by Omer Adam. Same anticipation, day-by-day, to Friday night – yet not for the party but for Shabbat.

Another popular 2021 song, “I live from Shabbat to Shabbat,” by singers Amir Benayoun and Subliminal, describes how time passes slowly until Shabbat – “the light that lights up my all life.”

What a long journey the Zionist ethos has made through music: from parties in clubs during the 1980s, to the prayers in synagogues in the 2020s.

Had protests been held in the 1990s to stop the “music revolution” with the same vigor, organization, funding, and foreign pressure we see today, perhaps we would never have gotten to the judicial revolution. The public sentiment would have been different had it not been “conquered by Tul Karem.”

But the music revolution happened, and its consequences were on high display 30 years later, during the month of Elul in Jerusalem.

Jerusalem in music

In Tel Aviv during this month, attempts to radicalize protesters accelerated. Bus stops and street signs throughout the city showed a fist with the word “Resist,” some showing fire and flames. “Resist 255 messianic dictatorship laws,” read the signs. It’s not clear if we are meant to resist the Messiah or laws accelerating his arrival.

Yet in Jerusalem, as the month of Elul was about to start, a party was held at the Tower of David. Zehava Ben, the Mizrahi singer whose glass ceiling 40 years ago would have been the outskirts of the central bus station, was now on center stage at one of the world’s most stunning citadels, energizing the crowd that included protesters and supporters of the judicial reform alike; those who are secular and religious: “God just give me a bit of luck,” she sang.

Two weeks later, the music revolution was on display again at the Jerusalem Beer Festival, which attracts thousands of people, including those from Tel Aviv. The crowd was dancing to the hassidic music of haredi singer Shuli Rand. Something unthinkable in the 1980s.

While in 1982 the song of the year was Benzin’s “Friday,” in 1985 it was the sacrilegious song “Waiting for Messiah” by Shalom Hanoch: “Messiah is not coming, Messiah is also not phoning.”

Rand surprised the audience by performing this song, making reference to the late religious philosopher Yeshayahu Leibowitz, who said that a messiah is not someone who is here but something you aspire to (akin to an asymptote function, or in the words of Shlomo Artzi in his song “Hardufim”: “Both you and I will not get there in most likelihood.”)

While Adam took the theme of “Friday” and gave it a religious spin, haredi singer Rand did not even bother. He kept the song as is, and just changed its meaning.

As Rand was performing in Independence Park, a short walk away in Sultan’s Pool was a performance by Artzi, the legendary secular singer, loved by Israelis for more than 50 years.

With the backdrop of the Old City walls, Artzi sang, “No, no, I will not give up on you,” echoing the words of prophets who lived inside the walls 3,000 years earlier, and of the Torah itself: We might be at the bottom of spirituality, in exile, in grief, in despair, in darkness, but God promised us: He will never give up on us. Similarly, Artzi intoned in another song: “In remote control, I stare from afar. I will not let you go until the love returns to us.”

Change is hard, and so are domestic rifts that come with it, but the music revolution and its consequences underscore that Israelis – demonstrating or supporting – are a nation of believers!

Two weeks later, as Elul and the year were coming to an end, religious singer Ishay Ribo performed at the same venue. Now the lyrics were no longer latent nor subject to interpretations. These were deeply religious songs that touched the souls of the crowd of secular, religious, protesters, supporters, Mizrahim, Ashkenazim (in Menachem Begin’s words: Jews!) – those at Sultan’s Pool, and those watching from above.  

Ribo finished his Sultan’s Pool concert, which also concluded the month of Elul and ushered us to the new year, with the final line of his flagship song: “Happy is the nation in which God is its lord.” 

The writer is the author of Judaism 3.0 – Judaism’s Transformation to Zionism (Judaism-Zionism.com).