JTA — For years, critics and supporters of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu alike have seen Hungary’s Viktor Orban as a model for his politics.

Netanyahu long called Orban a “true friend” who consistently backed Israel against criticism in Europe, and his allies said Orban’s policies kept Hungarian Jews safe amid increasing danger. His critics say he followed Orban down a dangerous path of democratic backsliding.

Now, in the wake of Orban’s spectacular defeat in Hungary’s election earlier this month, the comparison has taken on a different cast.

“Israel, soon,” Gilad Kariv, a Reform rabbi and member of Knesset from the liberal Democrats party wrote as he published a photo on his social media page of vast crowds gathering in Budapest to celebrate Orban’s defeat.

The upset in Hungary comes as Israel looks ahead to an election in the next six months, with polls showing Netanyahu facing an uphill battle to retain power. For his many critics, the results are fueling optimism for an Orban-like upset in Israel.

“Congrats Hungary. A new chapter is on the horizon for Israel too. It’s time for everyone who believes in a Jewish and democratic Israel to stand together and commit to that shared vision,” wrote UnXeptable, the Israeli opposition movement that launched in response to Netanyahu’s efforts to weaken the judiciary’s independence. “A brighter future is possible.”

On the right, too, the comparison was clear. In the hours after Orban’s defeat, one of the anti-Netanyahu protest movement’s most recognizable slogans, “Israel will not become Hungary,” was repurposed, ironically, by voices on the right as reassurance that Israel would not follow Hungary’s political trajectory.

Olga Deutsch, vice president of pro-Israel watchdog NGO Monitor and a researcher at the right-leaning Misgav Institute, said the discussion in Israel has been overwhelmingly inward-looking.

Israelis “view news from abroad through very local lenses,” she said. “There is much less debate on whether Orban had an amazing human rights track record inside of Hungary, or even about the Russia versus Ukraine discourse in the context of the EU. Rather, they debate his loss in the context of what that will mean for Israel.”

One strain of implications revolves around whether Magyar will be as supportive of Israel and its leader as Orban was. Early indications suggest that the answer is no. After Netanyahu suggested that Magyar had invited him back to Hungary this fall, Magyar announced that he would abide by the compact creating the International Criminal Court, meaning that Netanyahu cannot visit without facing arrest.

Tom Gross, a journalist with expertise on Middle East issues, said in an interview that he believed Israel was functioning as an “easy sacrificial lamb” for Magyar as the new Hungarian government seeks to unlock frozen EU funds.

“Even though Magyar may not personally have animosity towards the State of Israel, Israel — and in particular Bibi — will be the easiest sacrificial lamb to offer up to win over Brussels on other issues,” Gross said.

Yonatan Levi, a researcher at the London School of Economics and a fellow at Molad-The Center for the Renewal of Israeli Democracy, a Jerusalem-based policy group focused on democratic institutions, said the “intense public attention” to the Hungarian vote among Israelis was unusual for reasons going well beyond the Hungary-Israel relationship.

“I don’t remember any elections in a foreign country in recent years, except for the United States, that Israelis followed as closely as the Hungarian elections,” he said.

He attributed that focus to the widespread perception that Hungary has seemed like a blueprint for Netanyahu and his partners.

“Many of the laws and reforms that allowed Viktor Orban to take control of the courts, eliminate the free media, and completely politicize the public service have also been........

© The Times of Israel