Israel as the only ‘democracy’ in the region? Sorry, Binyamin Netanyahu is taking away that excuse

Illiberalism

Fig. 1. Photograph by Joachim F. Thurn, August 1991, Bundesarchiv, B 145 Bild-F089030-0003, via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0 DE.

Israel’s defenders often point to it being the only “democracy” in the Middle East. But it’s government is likely about to start looking a lot more like Turkey’s.

David Horovitz, “Hanukkah 2022, when Netanyahu began turning out the lights on Israeli democracy,” Times of Israel, January 1, 2023, https://www.timesofisrael.com/hanukkah-2022-when-netanyahu-began-turning-out-the-lights-on-israeli-democracy/

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Gilead

Twitter

Fig. 1. “Elon Musk shared a video of his entrance on his Twitter account.” Photograph attributed to Elon Musk, October 26, 2022, via the New York Post,^[1] fair use.

Elon Musk was the second person ever to amass a personal fortune of more than $200 billion, breaching that threshold in January 2021, months after Jeff Bezos.

The Tesla Inc. chief executive officer has now achieved a first of his own: becoming the only person in history to erase $200 billion from their net worth.^[2]

Karishma Vanjani and Al Root, “Tesla Drops Out of the 10 Biggest U.S. Public Companies,” Barron’s, December 27, 2022, https://www.barrons.com/articles/tesla-stock-price-market-cap-tsla-51672162042

Barron’s, “Tesla Falls to Two-Year Low. Why It May Not Have Bottomed Out,” December 28, 2022, https://www.barrons.com/articles/what-to-know-today-51672216064

Seth Masket, “RIP Twitter’s intellectual community,” Denver Post, December 29, 2022, https://www.denverpost.com/2022/12/29/why-leave-twitter-seth-masket-rip-twitter/

Meghan Bobrowsky, “Tesla Stock Fell 65% in 2022, Its Biggest-Ever Annual Decline,” Wall Street Journal, December 30, 2022, https://www.wsj.com/articles/tesla-stock-is-headed-for-its-biggest-ever-annual-decline-11672374248

Brian Chappatta, “Elon Musk Becomes First Person Ever to Lose $200 Billion,” Bloomberg, December 30, 2022, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-12-30/elon-musk-becomes-first-person-ever-to-lose-200-billion

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1. ^[1]Thomas Barrabi, “Elon Musk barges into Twitter HQ as deal nears: ‘Let that sink in,’” New York Post, October 26, 2022, https://nypost.com/2022/10/26/elon-musk-barges-into-twitter-headquarters-as-deal-nears/↩
2. ^[2]Brian Chappatta, “Elon Musk Becomes First Person Ever to Lose $200 Billion,” Bloomberg, December 30, 2022, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-12-30/elon-musk-becomes-first-person-ever-to-lose-200-billion↩