Why Eldad Yaniv's friends have abandoned him, and what that has to do with the management of his label
Eldad Yaniv doesn’t get why his friends are boycotting him, why his social circles are turning their backs on him, why long-time friends are not willing to talk to him, why a fellow grocery-shopper hissed offensive slurs toward him. Eldad Yaniv is now finally discovering that the public is willing to give a politician a second chance, but it is not willing to tolerate opportunists, who knead their label like dough.
Yaniv has been in the public’s consciousness for over three decades; Starting with a journalistic career at the IDF’s weekly magazine “BaMahane” and later with Yediot Aharonot Group, he was then officiated as a lawyer and served as a political and legal advisor for the Labour party. He served on Ehud Barak’s 99’ prime-ministerial campaign, then as Barak’s Chief of Staff at the Prime Minister’s office, and later admitted to his involvement in establishing fraudulent organizations and shadow-incrimination of senior political officials, such as former Chief of Staff Amnon Lipkin-Shahak. A few years later, when serving as the Attorney General of the Labour Party, he accused Amir Peretz of forging member forms.
In 2007 he joined Barak once again, but the two had a fallout after Yaniv won the party’s primary elections. At the same time, he established a private legal firm and worked with a series of public and private customers. In 2010 he was appointed by the State Comptroller to be a member of the Public Norms and State-Capital Relations Steering Committee. In 2012 he had already confessed to unethical behavior of his, or that of others which he experienced and witnessed, surrounding issues of state-capital relations.
Before then in 2009, he established “the National Left” movement with Shmulik Hasfari. In 2011 he shelved the movement and joined the cost-of-living/social justice protests. In 2012, he established “Eretz Chadasha” (Heb., New Country) together with the cinematographer Rani Blair, its mission statement being the fight against political corruption. In 2014 he ran for parliament as part of the Labour Party and wasn’t voted in. Afterwards, he focused his public work against Netanyahu’s corruption and the growing suspicions against him. He spoke at many of those rallies and was very much associated with them. After the elections however, he stated support for the elected government — a Netanyahu government.
His social-media posts always opened with the words “to my people”. And still, the amount of shit that has been thrown at him by “his people” would require an entire landfill to clean up. However, none of this should come as a surprise to Yaniv. The public is willing to accept one, and only one kind of transformation: a one direction transformation like that of Tzipi Livni: former head of the Labour Party, who went from being a die-hard Likud conservative to a peace-negotiator, and a prominent speaker in the protests against the regime overhaul. The public on the other hand is not willing to accept a chameleon that conveniently suits itself to the wave it's riding.
We either buy it or we don’t. When someone takes on a certain character, he is expected to live up to that character. And when someone wishes to change that character, it’s vice versa: He is essentially asking from the public for a renewed contract of trust. And when someone changes their character day in and day out, the public calls it out as BS. See here: Eldad Yaniv.