He is Israel’s longest-serving head of government, and no one can take that away from him, The largest number of votes have gone to him and his party time and time again. But after October 7, Bibi’s popularity has dropped. Now I know that Benjamin Netanyahu has many fans in Christian circles in the West. He is a brilliant politician. But above all, people say that Bibi is Israel’s best communicator and rhetorician. No one speaks better than Bibi. And that fascinates people at home and abroad.

His Likud voters rave about how a popular leader must, above all, talk. “Nobody speaks better than Bibi, and without him you cannot lead a people like Israel and defend them on the world stage.” But that automatically leads to a point in the biblical context that says that speaking is not the most important thing in leading a people, but the spirit of God. Moses could not speak well, but he had his brother Aaron as a speaker at his side.

Not everyone in Israel is on Benjamin Netanyahu’s side, and not everyone sees him as a head of government of words. And so I would like to introduce you to a song that I heard on the radio over the weekend. I have translated it for you so that you can get a little insight into what some Israelis think of Benjamin Netanyahu.

It is a song by Dori Ben Zeev (75), an Israeli radio presenter, songwriter, singer, actor, comedian, voice actor and music producer. For years, every Friday, two hours before Shabbat begins, I have been listening to his show “Weekend with Dori Ben Zeev” on Radio 88. I love his radio show, which gets me ready for the Shabbat. Dori has a good command of the Hebrew language and knows how to play with Hebrew words and roots with wit, talent and humor. No one in the country can do it quite like him. And so Dori rhymed a song about a magician in a country whose name is not important. And this magician had a trick – he knew how to talk.

In a country whose name is not important, a magician landed on a clear day, a magician with only one trick, but a huge trick.

The man knew how to talk without saying anything! Words, words, he shot out, without an “evil eye”, what a show, not even the devil could have created it.

And when someone asked: “Tell me, what did he say?”, they answered: “That is his greatness, he said nothing!” The audience was amazed: “He is a great magician. How can he talk and yet say nothing! Hocus-pocus, abracadabra, my dear, what a power of speech!”

He talked and talked and talked and talked, and it didn’t matter whether anything came of it, when he broke the speed of nothing, everyone immediately heard the bang.

The people went crazy: “Wow, what a speaker” and shouted to the steward: “We want an encore” and from all over the world, including the UN, they wanted to learn the art of public speaking from him.

As soon as he entered, the entire United Nations immediately rose to its feet to give him a storm of applause. Hocus-pocus, abracadabra, my dear, what power of speech!

So the man of words rose to greatness, he lived like a king and his wife like a queen, no one got beyond the blah-blah-blah until one morning the bluff was exposed.

At that hour everyone noticed: when you need him, the man disappears, and relying on him is like trusting in cobwebs, because there are words here, but no people at all!

The audience was amazed: “Where is the magician? The one who, without saying a word, has a parliamentary bloc majority, with such abracadabra and such power of speech, how can it be that the situation in the country is so bad?”

This song has a moral – that there is still a difference between a leader and a magician, that a magician can always pull an ace out of his sleeve, but then there is no difference between a country and a circus.

“In a country whose name is not important, on a clear day, a tremendous magician landed, a magician with only one trick, but a tremendous trick, he knew how to speak without saying anything!”

While you may not agree with how Dori wrote about Bibi without mentioning his name, it is a fact among the people that many can no longer stand what Benjamin Netanyahu says and does – even among his own right-wing Likud voters.