Draft Sharansky

A reader observes, a propos the post below, that Netanyahu is a divisive and controversial political figure whose profile at the head of a pro-Israel charm offensive might be seen as more offensive than charm in certain quarters. It's a fair point, although Netanyahu's ability to put a case across -- and, crucially, his ability to understand the British psyche -- is a rare attribute in Israeli politics.

There is, of course, a totally unimpeachable person who could do this job brilliantly and with unassailable moral authority, and this is Israel's erstwhile minister Natan Sharansky. He is also currently out of a job. What a weapon it would be to set Sharansky, the survivor of the gulag who understands from the inside the umbilical connection between communism and Jew-hatred and has had personal experience of what David Pryce-Jones has called the psychological warfare tactics employed by totalitarian regimes, against the Marxists and Trotskyites who have hijacked progressive politics in Britain and are currently employing such tactics to delegitimise Israel and terrorise and intimidate British Jews.

As Israel's former minister for the diaspora, Sharansky toured British universities and well understands the mortal moral sickness that now grips them. Even when he was a minister, however, he was so low down the pecking order -- and the cause of trying to put Israel's case in Britain is so cavalierly underrated by the Israeli government -- that he did not have the kind of backing that is required to tackle this wholesale cultural malaise. The fact that he is now out of the government makes such an appointment sadly even more unlikely.

But what if there were a clamour from Britain for Sharansky to be appointed to such a role of educating the universities out of their profound ignorance and taking on the British heirs to his erstwhile jailers? Just as they once worked to get Sharansky out of Russia, what if British Jews now started working to get Sharansky into Britain? The campaign starts here.