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Netanyahu and Trump. Credit: Jonathan Ernst/Reuters

Even if both the United States and Israel vote against their would-be autocrats this fall, the question remains: What comes next? In both countries, the opposition is in fragmented and adrift

It's no surprise that the country that most closely mirrors the United States in terms of the tensions surrounding preservation of its liberal democracy is Israel. Israel has been America's "little brother" for decades, perhaps back as far as the Six-Day War in 1967, when President Lyndon Johnson's "amber light" (an ambiguous signal understood as tacit consent) was considered sufficient assurance to allow Israel to launch the air strikes that commenced the war. The United States refused to acquiesce to the demand, in United Nations Security Council Resolution 242, that Israel immediately withdraw from the territories it conquered, thus leading to the occupation that is now 59 years old. And so on.