The November 5, 2025, Israel Insights webinar, hosted by the Jan Koum Israel Studies Program (JKISP) at the Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law (CDDRL), featured a conversation between Amichai Magen, director of JKISP, and Ambassador Vivian Bercovici, former Canadian ambassador to Israel and a leading commentator on Israeli politics and society. Bercovici reflected on her tenure as a political appointee under Prime Minister Stephen Harper, describing tensions between Canada’s elected leadership and its foreign service bureaucracy, particularly on Israel policy. She emphasized that her mandate was to implement government policy rather than shape it, and discussed efforts to strengthen Canada–Israel commercial and technological ties amid institutional resistance and limited subject-matter expertise within the bureaucracy.

The discussion then turned to Israel’s current political and social trajectory following the judicial reform crisis and the October 7 Hamas attack. Bercovici argued that Israel’s next election could be the most consequential in the country’s history, with the future of liberal democracy and civic responsibility at stake. She highlighted a growing societal divide over the state’s founding ethos of shared obligation — particularly debates surrounding the return of hostages, unequal military and national service, and declining commitment among some groups to democratic norms. The webinar concluded with a discussion of how these tensions may reshape Israel’s political culture and determine the character of the state in the years ahead.

A full recording of the webinar can be viewed below: