A pro-Netanyahu pundit called Gadi Eisenkot a 'monkey,' recalling when an entertainer derided 'hooligans' on the right and helped Menachem Begin in 1981. Nowadays, Israel's politics are far more fragmented, and news moves faster

Yashar party likens remark to infamous 1981 'chah’chahim' speech that insulted Likud voters; Yinon Magal says he used the term to mean a puppet controlled by others, not as racist jab