My late father was a regular listener of "Energy Zahabi", and I never understood it. I usually don't connect to yelling, but there are many who get goosebumps to hear a loud radio format of listeners calling in to fight and take bites out of the broadcast from the presenter.
Natan Zahavi did it on the radio for 25 years.
The years passed, cigarette smoke filled his lungs, listeners came and went, and it's hard to say that the presenter has changed in anything.
Zahavi remained just as nervous, just as at the beginning, while the public discourse only grew more heated.
Synopsis of the previous episodes: Zehavi became known as a serial troublemaker, who was repeatedly suspended throughout his extensive career;
Most of the suspensions are designed to calm his opponents, because they will no longer be able to change him.
After wishing on air for the burning down of Channel 14 - he was suspended and forced to apologize.
Four months ago he uttered a statement about tefillin wearers who "should hang themselves", and was again thrown home.
However, this time he refused to participate in the regular apology ceremony, and according to this week's publication in "Maku" - he will probably not return to broadcast his daily program on 103FM.
The 76-year-old Zahavi is a dinosaur in social terms, but he is not unusual.
Thanks to Facebook, Twitter and Tiktok, today it can be understood that he and the hot listeners who came to his broadcast are not the exceptions.
How is Zahavi, with his poisonous tongue, the extreme populism and the wild incitement he gave free rein in his program, different from what we receive every day from our politicians, from the shouters in the studios, from the excessive talkbackists and network personalities, who spread evil and rage and curses on every platform and at every opportunity?
When ministers encourage the obliteration of an entire village, when a coalition enacts laws designed to serve corruption, when the opposition warms up and pushes for violence, what do we care about Nathan Zahavi?
This is the Israeli culture of the year 2023: shouting, cursing, insults, confrontations, generalizations, disdain and real hatred.
And it's not that at some point in history Zahavi was considered a factor of influence or a trailblazer - after all, he was always abnormal, disturbed with wild hair, a cigarette in his mouth and zero tact.
But when you look at the chaos in the Land of Israel right now, it feels like Zahavi was just a little ahead of his time.
Therefore, it doesn't really matter anymore if Zahavi is on the radio or not, because the entire Israeli state has become a kind of variant of an angry Zahavi.
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