The Fall of Ari Shavit

Ari Shavit, Haaretz columnist and author of My Promised Land: The Triumph and Tragedy of Israel (2013), has lost a lot of respect after a journalist alleged being harassed by him. The initial article did not name him but his connection to this incident has since been confirmed.

Seeing this incident I could not help but wonder if the COGs have mentioned him.

PCG Quoting Ari Shavit

PCG mentioned him three times, twice in 2006 while discussing the war with Hezbollah and once in 2009 discussing the one year anniversary of Operation Cast Lead.

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Israel’s political disunion is easily and accurately perceived by its many foes as being a vulnerability, something to exploit. With the cease-fire now being implemented, some analysts said that, Olmert’s boasting over Israel’s “victory” notwithstanding, this war has been sufficiently botched that the prime minister’s days in office are already numbered. As Haaretz columnist Ari Shavit wrote,

There is no mistake Ehud Olmert did not make this past month. He went to war hastily, without properly gauging the outcome. He blindly followed the military without asking the necessary questions. He mistakenly gambled on air operations, was strangely late with the ground operation, and failed to implement the army’s original plan, much more daring and sophisticated than that which was implemented. And after arrogantly and hastily bursting into war, Olmert managed it hesitantly, unfocused and limp. He neglected the home front and abandoned the residents of the north. He also failed shamefully on the diplomatic front .… 

The day Nasrallah comes out of his bunker and declares victory to the whole world, Olmert must not be in the prime minister’s office. Post-war battered and bleeding Israel needs a new start and a new leader. It needs a real prime minister. (Cease-Fire Follows Israeli Division Over War Strategy, August 14, 2006.)

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As the UN-mandated cease-fire came into effect on August 14, voices within Israel descended upon the prime minister in crushing condemnation—even demanding he leave office. Haaretz columnist Ari Shavit, for example, wrote, “There is no mistake Ehud Olmert did not make this past month. He went to war hastily, without properly gauging the outcome. He blindly followed the military without asking the necessary questions. He mistakenly gambled on air operations, was strangely late with the ground operation, and failed to implement the army’s original plan, much more daring and sophisticated than that which was implemented. And after arrogantly and hastily bursting into war, Olmert managed it hesitantly, unfocused and limp. He neglected the home front and abandoned the residents of the north. He also failed shamefully on the diplomatic front. … Post-war battered and bleeding Israel needs a new start and a new leader. It needs a real prime minister” (August 11). (Joel Hilliker, Who Won?, October 2006.)

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In an analysis of Haniyeh’s statement, Haaretz correspondent Ari Shavit wrote this:

In recent years, quite a number of experts have promised us that Hamas does not really mean it. Hamas is only playing tough, but its intentions are lofty: ceasefire, Green Line, coexistence. Live and let live. But no message conveyed by any senior Hamas member to any diplomat behind closed doors is equal in status to the message conveyed by Haniyeh to the masses. What counts is only the direct and open statement made by the Palestinian leader to his people. Palestine, all of Palestine. Every piece of Israeli land on which any Israeli citizen lives. His home, your home, our home. The land beneath our feet. (Remember Hamas?, December 18, 2009.)

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Although Shavit gained much more attention with his 2013 book PCG's writers never mentioned him afterwards in their articles.

UCG Quoting Shavit

UCG has quoted Shavit two times. Once in 2002 while discussing violence during the Second Intifada of 2000-5 and once in 2014 in a little article.

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The confidence of Israel is slowly ebbing away. Reporter Hammer quotes Ha'aretz newspaper columnist Ari Shavit as lamenting, “There is this feeling that we tried politics, we tried the army, we tried everything. What's left?” (Robin Webber, This Is The Way...Getting Underneath the Skin, August 1, 2002.)

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He is also cited as a source in an article dated March 11, 2014 entitled "Israel: A Nation in Dire Peril" written by Jerald Aust and John Ross Schroeder.

LCG and COGWA does not appear to have quoted Shavit.

And so it is apparent that PCG and UCG have quoted Shavit previously but he appears to have gained little attention in the world of Armstrongism.