The Israeli government is headed for yet another round of elections. Although the official election date for the next Knesset is November 7, 2017, no one ever expected this government to last that long. The voting will likely take place in March of 2015.
What do the new elections mean outside of Israel? Nothing very good, I’m afraid. For the most part, any elections held in the foreseeable future are going to cement the status quo even further, and where they don’t do so, elections will mean a shift even further rightward.
In the short term, Europe will likely agree with the United States to keep doing what they’re doing now with regard to an Israeli-Palestinian agreement, which is nothing. But in the long term, they are both likely to be saddled with an Israeli government that will be even more blatant about its refusal of any accommodation with the Palestinians, and even more insistent on building more and more settlements, especially in Jerusalem.
There is, however, a good deal of flux in Israeli politics right now. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has seen his popularity plummet. His Gaza operation over the summer is not being viewed positively in Israel, as many see no difference in the situation with Gaza today from earlier in the year. Israelis may agree with many of his stances, but they’re not as keen on the way he executes his policies—they see Netanyahu as having eroded the relationship with the United States and having failed to stem the increasing hostility toward Israel in the rest of the world.
But more than anything else, Bibi’s economic policies have driven down his ratings. Although the Israeli economy writ large is relatively healthy, economic disparity within Israel, even among Israeli Jews, has never been worse, as the distribution of wealth in Israel rivals the extremely skewed scale we have grown accustomed to in the United States. And just like Americans in the United States, most Israelis are primarily concerned with the economy, jobs, and supporting their families—not foreign policy.
Another similarity between the United States and Israel is the lack of leadership options. Only some 33% of Israelis believe Netanyahu is the best man for the prime minister’s job, and his approval rating is around that same figure. But that puts him far ahead of any other major player on the Israeli scene. The next most popular choice for prime minister, according to the polls, is Isaac Herzog of the Labor Party at around 17%. Netanyahu’s Likud Party also polls significantly higher than any other party, so the overwhelming likelihood is that Netanyahu will win another election.
But the real question is what his coalition would look like. As we’ve seen in the last several Israeli elections, cobbling together a governing coalition is no easy feat. It requires serious compromises that could result in the same prime minister being forced to take on rather different policies depending on the coalition. The right-wing coalition that came to power in 2013 pushed Netanyahu into even more hawkish positions than he already held, both internationally and domestically. What would the next one do?
The current government, led by Netanyahu’s right-wing Likud Coalition, consists of the Russian/right-wing Yisrael Beiteinu (Israel, Our Home) party headed by Avigdor Lieberman; HaBayit HaYehudi (Jewish Home) headed by Naftali Bennett; Yesh Atid, a centrist party led by former television anchor Yair Lapid; and Ha’Tnuah, headed by Tzipi Livni. While all of these parties have clashed with Netanyahu at one time or another, Lapid and Livni are the most at odds with Bibi right now.
Netanyahu would certainly try to form a new coalition without Lapid or Livni. Between Likud and the other two far-right parties currently in the coalition, Netanyahu could reasonably count on around 50 seats in the next Knesset. Sixty-one seats are needed to form a governing coalition. But while Bennett has warmed up to Netanyahu, Lieberman, whose party formed a joint ticket with Netanyahu in the last election, has become a political enemy. So how will Netanyahu cobble together a coalition?
Netanyahu’s Likud and Bennett’s HaBayit Hayehudi are currently polling at about 40 seats between them, perhaps a few more. Another twenty or so would then be needed to form the next government. One candidate is the ultra-Orthodox Shas party. They will want to address their core demands, which are generally based on the economic concerns of their constituency: lower-income Jews of Iberian and Middle Eastern descent. They used to support a theoretical two-state solution, but have recently shifted farther to the right on the issue of the occupation and have always been firm about not dividing Jerusalem. Shas is polling between six and ten seats.
United Torah Judaism is an Ashkenazi coalition party (Jews of European descent, excluding Iberia) that is similar to Shas, but more devoted to maintaining the place of religion in Israel and less interested in foreign policy matters, including the occupation. UTJ will bring 7 or 8 seats.
If, as Netanyahu has suggested, he forms a coalition with the religious parties, it seems very possible that between Likud, and the three religious parties, he could get very close or possibly even exceed the 61-seat threshold. But he’s likely to need one more party, and while Labor, Livni, and Lapid all refuse to rule out being in a Netanyahu-led coalition, they will all face tremendous internal pressure not to do so, and, in any event, Bibi almost certainly doesn’t want them, lest he perpetuate the same unstable coalition he is trying to get out of now.
In all of this, there is a wild card, in the form of a new player in the election game. Popular ex-Likud figure, Moshe Kahlon has formed a party of his own, as yet unnamed, and it figures to be a key player in the next election. Kahlon, who is very well-liked among the Israeli public for having reformed the cellular communications industry, left Likud because he felt it had “lost its way.” He is a classic Likud hawk more in the mold of Menachem Begin than Netanyahu. But his real appeal exists in the fact that like Begin and very much unlike Netanyahu, he tends to emphasize economic equality and social welfare. He would not promote the blatant racism Netanyahu does, and that might help a bit with the current internal strife. He would also want to try to maintain a peace process, even while he holds positions on the occupation and security that are not far away from Bibi’s. Current polls have his new party winning between 9 and 12 seats.
So, what kind of government comes out of all this? Kahlon may, in many ways, hold the key to that question. The most likely coalition would consist of Likud, HaBayit HaYehudi, Shas and Kahlon’s party, with UTJ possibly tagging along or replacing Shas. The price of the latter parties’ agreements would be some change in economic and social policies in Israel. This could amount to a government that does more to assuage popular domestic anger than the current one, but is even more hawkish on the occupation. Kahlon could also turn into a somewhat more powerful version of Livni in the next government. His party would likely hold considerably more seats and he is much more popular with Israelis than Livni ever was.
If Kahlon does better in the election than currently projected, he could also possibly be the one to form the next government. Kahlon would not necessarily have to out-poll Likud to do this. He would merely need to have enough seats and support from other parties to convince Israeli President Reuven Rivlin (who despises Netanyahu and whose appointment to the presidency Bibi tried to block) that he stands a better chance of forming a coalition than Netanyahu does. That’s an unlikely move for him, but not out of the question since Kahlon could, if he wished, form a broad based government that could include Yisrael Beiteinu, Yesh Atid, and Labor, as well as Shas and UTJ. Such a government would be far more likely to renew the peace process, but, especially given the increasing apathy or even militancy with which most Israelis view the occupation, no more likely to actually move it forward.
Considered in that light, there might be reason to hope that an even more extreme right-wing government takes power. Perhaps that would fan the small sparks we are seeing from Europe toward real pressure on Israel. But when it comes right down to it, neither scenario is promising.
Photograph: Former Likud Minister Moshe Kahlon, in Haifa, Israel, November 2012
]]>by Mitchell Plitnick
It’s a busy week for Secretary of State John Kerry. On Monday, he received Israel’s top two negotiators, Tzipi Livni and Isaac Molho. Then he packed his bags and headed off to the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. Kerry will have any number of important tasks in Davos, [...]]]>
by Mitchell Plitnick
It’s a busy week for Secretary of State John Kerry. On Monday, he received Israel’s top two negotiators, Tzipi Livni and Isaac Molho. Then he packed his bags and headed off to the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. Kerry will have any number of important tasks in Davos, but perhaps the highest profile of them will be a sideline meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. These meetings, it is said, are meant to “bridge the gaps between Israel and the Palestinians.”
If anyone was holding out hope that these talks were anything more than a sham, those words should end such hopes. The framing of the United States bridging the gap between Israel and the Palestinians belies the reality of Israeli anger and Palestinian disappointment bordering on feelings of betrayal in terms of the US’ relationship with both sides. Let’s just look at where things stand.
President Barack Obama, it was reported last weekend, sees “less than a fifty-fifty chance” that a deal can be struck between Israel and the Palestinians. That’s what he told David Remnick of The New Yorker. It leaves a lot of space, and given Obama’s general subscription to the Realist school of foreign policy, one has to think he believes it to be much, much less than fifty-fifty. Remnick’s interview with Obama was a number of weeks back; it’s fair to believe that events since then have driven Obama’s estimate even farther down.
Last week, Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon came out with as brazen an insult as can be recalled by a top Israeli official directed at a major US official, rudely describing Kerry as “obsessive and messianic.” The insult itself, exceptional as it was, was highlighted by the fact that Netanyahu did not rebuke his Defense Minister for insulting Israel’s patron. That sent a strong message about where Israel stands, and it could hardly have been missed within the context of Israel’s having recently raised the bar for even a framework agreement yet again.
That was done in the first week of 2014 when Netanyahu told a meeting of his Likud faction in the Knesset that he would never consent to withdraw from Hebron or Beit El, two settlements with historical religious significance to Jews, but exist well outside the settlement blocs that Israel has long assumed (along with the US) — despite a lack of Palestinian agreement — would remain under Israeli control in a deal. One can simply look at a map and see how even the most naïve and back-bending view of a two-state solution cannot possibly see an Israel in control of Hebron and Beit El allowing for a viable and contiguous Palestinian state.
All of this is added to the already unreasonable Israeli conditions of maintaining occupying forces in the Jordan Valley under a bogus pretext of security as the former head of the Mossad recently confirmed; and on Palestinian recognition of Israel as a Jewish State, something that is simply anathema to Palestinians, unprecedented in international relations and completely unnecessary for Israel. This leaves almost no foundation for Kerry to work with, no matter how dedicated he may be to bridging the two sides.
The Palestinians have raised other issues beyond these as well. Ongoing settlement construction, not only in the settlement blocs but crucially in the very much disputed areas of East Jerusalem, has been a major headache for the Palestinian negotiators. This is increasing pressure on the PA from within the West Bank and shifting a sizeable portion of Palestinian opinion from having lost faith in Abbas and his team to outright hostility toward them. That situation is certainly not about to abate. In response to European censure of Israel’s settlement project, Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman displayed remarkable hubris in summoning five European ambassadors to rebuke them for trying to stand up for international law and basic pragmatism in peacemaking. So Israel is getting only more aggressive about its settlement expansion.
The Palestinians also voiced their displeasure last week at an early outline of Kerry’s proposal, which they said made no mention at all of the right of return for Palestinian refugees or of Jerusalem’s status as the Palestinian capital. They are already preparing plans to return to pressing their case for statehood at the United Nations in the expectation that these talks will fail.
So what can Kerry do? It would seem very little. The Palestinians are under so much internal pressure that they are standing much more firmly than they have in past negotiations. Israel keeps moving the goalposts, despite already having set down conditions that no Palestinian leader could possibly meet. In order to create a bridge, there must be firm ground on either side to start building the two ends, and there seems to be far less common ground between Israel and the Palestinians than at any time since the two sides began negotiating two decades ago. There doesn’t seem to be a lot of ground for Kerry to stand on either.
No doubt, Kerry is hoping that he has some sway now over Netanyahu. The bill in the US Senate to increase sanctions and torpedo the fledgling diplomatic initiative between the P5+1 and Iran has stalled, at least for the moment, despite having gathered an appalling 59 co-sponsors. The preliminary agreement on Iran’s nuclear program has just gone into effect and so far is going well, while the US stood firm against Iran’s participation in the Geneva II peace conference regarding Iran’s ally, Syria. Having held the Iran issue at bay, Kerry may be thinking that his meeting with Netanyahu in Davos will be an opportunity to push Israel on the Palestinian issue and perhaps get Bibi to back off on some of the thorny issues. Kerry may well be hoping that if, for example, Netanyahu relented on Palestinian recognition of Israel as a Jewish state, the US may be able to convince the Palestinians to, for instance, accept a continued Israeli presence in the Jordan Valley.
Kerry may believe Netanyahu is particularly vulnerable right now, as he has heard from a group of 100 Israeli business leaders that he must reach a peace deal with the Palestinians because “the world is running out of patience and the threat of sanctions is rising.” He also heard from key coalition partner, Yair Lapid, head of the Yesh Atid party that he would quit Netanyahu’s government, threatening the governing coalition if the peace process did not get back on track.
But none of this is terribly likely to sway Netanyahu, even though it does represent more pressure to accommodate the peace talks than Bibi is accustomed to. And even if it does, it is highly unlikely that Mahmoud Abbas can afford to compromise on any of the current issues. If he allows a continued Israeli presence after an alleged “end to the occupation,” relents on Jerusalem, allows Israel to hold on to settlements outside the major blocs, or compromises on any of the issues that Netanyahu has brought to the fore in the last year, there is likely to be a major upheaval in the West Bank.
More likely, I think, is that Kerry is playing a carrot and stick game with Israel. He is smacking Bibi down for his arrogance on the peace process and his audacity in once again brazenly trying to play Congress against the Obama administration on Iran. His message in that case would be that if diplomacy with Iran is allowed to proceed apace, Kerry would allow Israel to maintain its intransigence unopposed after the April deadline for the current talks passes.
In either scenario, the Palestinians lose. There is no foundation for an agreement now between the two parties. The hope for a resolution lies not in this process, but in the growing threat of economic action along the lines of that which we’ve seen the Netherlands take recently coupled with renewed activism at the United Nations. Because above all else, it seems clear that Obama and probably Kerry as well understand that not only are the chances of success between Israel and the Palestinians “less than 50-50,” they are in fact about 50 points less.
]]>by Mitchell Plitnick
The new Israeli government features a security braintrust that might be a bit more reasonable on Iran, but is likely to be even more hawkish both in the immediate region and within the country itself. Gone are voices from the Israeli right who favored a more reasoned [...]]]>
by Mitchell Plitnick
The new Israeli government features a security braintrust that might be a bit more reasonable on Iran, but is likely to be even more hawkish both in the immediate region and within the country itself. Gone are voices from the Israeli right who favored a more reasoned and diplomatic approach to their right-wing agenda. They have been replaced by figures who want more direct action and refuse even the pretense of a two-state solution.
On Iran, the retirement of Ehud Barak removes Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s leading supporter in his effort for a strike on Iran sooner rather than later, whether that be carried out by Israel or, preferably, the United States. He is replaced by Moshe “Bogey” Ya’alon. Bogey is also an Iran hawk, but is not in favor of Israel launching an attack other than as a last resort. He is far more content than Barak to allow the United States to take the lead and wants Israel to act only if it becomes apparent that the US will not. That puts him pretty well in line with the Israeli military and intelligence leadership in practice, though he sees Iran as more of a threat than they do.
In fact, no one in the current or even the outgoing inner circle came close to matching Barak’s eagerness for military action against Iran. Only Netanyahu himself could match him, and he remains daunted by the lack of support for his position in Israel. The ongoing hawkishness in the US Congress and President Barack Obama’s repeated statements holding firm to a military option and refusing a policy of containment also blunt Netanyahu’s resolve. It would seem that, at least for the time being, the calls for war on Iran will be fueled more in the United States than in Israel.
Ya’alon is a former Chief of Staff of the Israel Defense Forces, but he did not have a distinguished term of service there, was not well-liked and returns without a great deal of good will among the military and intelligence services’ leadership. In fact, colleagues in Israel tell me there is a good deal of consternation in those services regarding Bogey’s appointment. But for now, they will wait and see how he acts. For a deeper look at Ya’alon, see my recent piece on him here.
The new braintrust is also somewhat unpredictable. Its key players are inexperienced, especially in international diplomatic and security matters. On that front, if the loss of Barak turns the heat down on Iran a bit, the departures of Likud stalwarts Dan Meridor and Benny Begin turn it up regionally and domestically. Both were relative moderates in Likud, thoughtful strategists and believers in at least the Israeli version of the rule of law.
Meridor in particular tended to be a moderating voice that Netanyahu trusted on foreign policy matters, including the Palestinian issue. The closest the new group will have now is Tzipi Livni, the former Foreign Minister.
Livni is widely regarded as standing virtually alone in the new government as a dedicated supporter of the two-state solution. This, however, is somewhat belied by her experience as Foreign Minister. Though considered a leading dove even then, Livni rejected an offer from the Palestinian Authority that gave Israel virtually all it had demanded on matters of territory, Jerusalem and refugees. Still, Livni was the only candidate among mainstream parties to have run in the last election on an explicit platform of negotiating with the Palestinians and support for a two-state solution. That this puts her far ahead of the rest of Netanyahu’s cabinet says a great deal about the nature of the new governing coalition.
In any case, Livni’s voice is not one which carries a great deal of weight with Netanyahu. He may value her presence as a sort of fig leaf for the US and Europe to allow them to believe that there is some kind of peace process to restart, but the two have never gotten along and there’s little love or respect between them. It may be that Bibi will pay her a bit more mind due to the inexperience of the rest of his cabinet, but even if that is the case, her voice will never carry anything like the weight Meridor’s did.
The other two key players in the government, Yair Lapid and Naftali Bennett, are newcomers who have no experience in any of the diplomatic and security issues this group will be dealing with. It is difficult to say how they will act with regard to Iran, Egypt, Syria and Lebanon. In Israeli politics, being a comparative centrist, like Lapid, or a far-right figure like Bennett is not necessarily a good indicator of how they will think about external security matters.
But regarding the Palestinians, Bennett and Lapid have both been very clear. Lapid wants negotiations and is willing to part with some territory, but believes Israel must take an absolutist stance on the matters of Palestinian refugees and Jerusalem. In other words, he supports negotiations that cannot possibly lead anywhere. Bennett opposes even that, putting forth a plan based on a basic assumption that sharing the land cannot work and therefore the Palestinians must be “managed.”
The remainder of the group consists of Home Front Security and Communications Minister Gilad Erdan, Public Security Minister Yitzhak Aharonovitz and the empty chair being reserved for Avigdor Lieberman when and if he clears the breach of public trust charges he is currently under indictment for so he can resume his position as Foreign Minister. Aharonovitz, from Lieberman’s Yisrael Beiteinu party, served as Public Security Minister in the last government, so he has some experience, but his voice has never been seen as influential in the cabinet deliberations, or even in the Knesset.
Erdan is a younger, ultra-conservative Likud Minister of Communications, known for his vocal opposition to the peace process, support for revoking citizenship for “disloyalty,” and a marked racist attitude toward Arabs. In this, he is, in many ways, a kindred spirit of the man who might temporarily occupy Lieberman’s seat at the table, Ze’ev Elkin, the new Deputy Foreign Minister, appointed by Netanyahu with Lieberman’s full support.
Elkin, who has been a driving force in the Knesset behind anti-democratic legislation targeting Israeli NGOs that advocate for peace or defend the human rights of Palestinians, and would explicitly subordinate Israel’s democratic structures to its Jewish character as a matter of law, is an explicit advocate for annexation of the West Bank. That stance actually puts him to the right of Lieberman. Elkin is also a hawk on Iran, and supports a unilateral Israeli strike.
It is unclear whether Elkin will be part of the cabinet meetings, and the fact that Netanyahu has actually divided up many of the duties of the Foreign Minister while the actual office is vacant indicates he will not be. Yet, even if he is, neither he nor Erdan has a powerful voice in these proceedings. Indeed, no one in this cabinet has a voice that is likely to be all that influential on Netanyahu, though the sheer political power that Bennett and Lapid wield will mean that Bibi needs to give their stances serious consideration.
What do we conclude from all of this? Much will depend on Moshe Ya’alon. His voice is sure to have the most sway in this cabinet despite Netanyahu not being all that fond of him. Bibi wasn’t crazy about Ehud Barak either. But the bigger question regarding Bogey is whether he will try to change the leadership of the military and intelligence services. Those leaders — Tamir Pardo (Mossad), Benny Gantz (IDF Chief of Staff), Aviv Kochavi (military intelligence, or Aman, who is much more hawkish on Iran than the others), and Yoram Cohen (Shin Bet) — have been a generally moderating force on Bibi’s ambitions. With the inexperience of the rest of the new cabinet, their voices will be even more influential. But Bogey is not necessarily on the same page with these men and could move to replace some or all of them.
Either way, there are a few things we can be sure of. The new cabinet will have to live with the fact that the Obama Administration seems to have asserted control over the Iran standoff, at least for this year. The struggle over an attack on Iran will be fought in Washington, not Jerusalem. And it seems this cabinet will be largely content with that as long as the status quo holds.
But the new cabinet will be towing an even harder line on the Palestinians. With Obama seeming, from his recent speeches, to have given up on trying to get Israel to change its course, Israel’s abandonment in practice of the Oslo process will be set in stone, and where things go from there will depend on other actors, including Turkey, Europe, the Arab League states and the Palestinians themselves.
The real wild card is going to be the neighboring states. How will Israel react as instability in Syria, Lebanon, Egypt and possibly Jordan continues to grow? Without seasoned voices in his cabinet that he trusts like Meridor, Barak and Begin, and given that the voices Bibi will have to listen to are Lapid and Bennett, but only because of their political power, Netanyahu — already a leader who is slavishly devoted to guidance by the latest public opinion polls — is likely to become even more of a prime minister who sways on these issues with the political winds.
]]>Well, here it is, the day after. The Israeli elections are over, but the form of the next government is not at all clear. Most likely, Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud Beiteinu party will form a government with Yair Lapid’s Yesh Atid party being the main partner. This is by far the most [...]]]>
Well, here it is, the day after. The Israeli elections are over, but the form of the next government is not at all clear. Most likely, Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud Beiteinu party will form a government with Yair Lapid’s Yesh Atid party being the main partner. This is by far the most likely scenario, though others possibilities exist, even a million-to-one long shot that Lapid could form a government. Labor is likely to be leading the opposition, unless Lapid surprises everyone and stays out of a Netanyahu-led government.
The new Knesset will be somewhat less tilted to the right than the last one, but this is not likely to make a big difference in terms of Israel’s approach to the Palestinians. Indeed, in some ways, it might serve Netanyahu to have a friendlier face in Lapid to cover policies that might be slightly different rhetorically but essentially the same on the ground. More than anything else, the shift in government is going to be felt domestically, in terms of greater attention to civic and economic issues. Indeed, no Israeli election in my memory compares to this one for the dominance of domestic over security issues.
Given that there’s still more to see before the full ramifications of the election are known, I’ll engage here with a few winners and losers.
Winners
Yair Lapid: Lapid comes out of this as a major power broker…for now. I suspect Bibi will try to convince him to take the Finance portfolio, because the looming budget cuts are very likely to undermine whoever takes that job. If Lapid has any sense, he will stay away from this job. Bibi might decide to make him Foreign Minister, allowing Lapid’s much more charming visage to replace both last term’s technical Foreign Minister, Avigdor Lieberman (who had to quit when he was indicted) and the de facto one, a combination of Ehud Barak and Netanyahu. The idea is to improve Israel’s face in the international arena and stem of the criticism Israel has been facing, especially from Europe. Long-term, parties like Lapid’s, which are essentially cults of personality, tend to have a short shelf life. And Lapid doesn’t have much of a political program, as he wisely stuck to very broad, general and populist statements in his campaign. But for now, Lapid holds the key to Bibi’s ability to form a coalition, although it is possible for Bibi to form a government without him. Lapid had been doing well in polls and well exceeded those projections, so as of today, he is in really good shape.
Naftali Bennett/HaBayit HaYehudi: Many polls projected Bennett with the number of seats that Lapid got, so some see the 11 seats HaBayit HaYehudi won as a disappointment. But the party had all of three seats in the previous Knesset, and Bennett has put the national religious camp, as a distinct unit in the Israeli polity, back on the map. Bennett can now choose between a secondary role in the government or leading the rightward tug on Israel from outside the government. That’s not a bad place for him to be, long term. Bibi rebuilt Likud from that position after it was devastated by Ariel Sharon’s formation of Kadima nearly a decade ago. Either way, Bennett remains able to build himself into the face of the Israeli right for years to come.
Meretz: The only Zionist party that could remotely be called truly left-wing doubled its presence in the Knesset, from three seats to six. That’s the most seats it has won since the 1999 election. It’s still not a very influential party, but Zehava Gal-On has it back on track as the voice of the Jewish left, which has been terribly muted in Israel. Building on this momentum is likely to be just as difficult for Gal-On as halting Meretz’s downward spiral was. But she’s the best leader they’ve had in a long time, maybe ever. She is articulating a strong left-wing point of view, instead of mealy-mouthed political mumbo-jumbo, and that is bringing back leftist voters.
Barack Obama: No one will ever know how much of an effect Obama’s words to Jeffrey Goldberg, published mere days before the election, might have had on Netanyahu’s losses in this election. But count me among those who think it mattered. Yes, this was Israel’s most domestically focused election ever. And it’s also true that few Likud-Beiteinu voters like Obama. But Israelis are not fools; they know Israel needs to improve its relationship with both the White House and European leaders. Unlike most Americans, Israelis across the political spectrum know that Bibi actively interfered with the US election and, what’s worse, did so by backing the wrong horse. That has since faded from Israeli headlines, and Goldberg’s article didn’t make big news in Israel. But it did make news, and many Israelis follow the global and US media on Israel very closely. In any case, a second-term Obama will now be dealing with a chastened Netanyahu. At the very least, this was a pleasant night for Obama, and it could help support and embolden Obama if he decides to take Bibi on again.
Opposition to an Iran attack: This was actually taking shape in the election campaign. Iran was not a prominent issue at all. Israel still wants the US to take care of Iran, but the opposition to a unilateral Israeli strike among the military and intelligence brass remains just as strong as ever. A move toward the political center and, more importantly, an election that reflects looking within the country rather than outside it when identifying Israel’s biggest challenges blunts even farther the threat of Israeli action, which means less pressure on the US to act militarily. With Iranian elections looming in a few months, and the accompanying end of the Ahmadinejad era, an attack has almost certainly been pushed back, quite possibly to the point where an agreement can be reached to entirely avert one. Netanyahu’s need to use glamorous government positions like the Defense Ministry to entice coalition partners likely means Ehud Barak’s minimal chances of staying in his present job have been reduced to zero. An attack on Iran is considerably less likely today than it was before.
Losers
The Palestinians: The occupation was, at best, a minor question in Israel’s 2013 election. There were many pro forma statements from Labor’s Shelly Yachimovitch, HaTnuah’s Tzipi Livni and Lapid about supporting the two-state solution, usually with something like the Clinton Parameters outline or some such. But it was always an afterthought. Livni and Yachimovitch occasionally attacked Netanyahu for letting Israel’s global image suffer due to his intransigence on the Palestinian issue, while Lapid’s Yesh Atid platform had support for two states as its final plank. What seems to be looming is a Netanyahu who might moderate some of his public statements on the subject, but will head a government that will stick to the same policies of obstructionism that it has held to these past four years, but with a less confrontational tone when it comes to the US and Europe. That’s not a recipe for progress, but rather for maintaining the status quo while blunting the only pressure that could conceivably bring about change. If Naftali Bennett is in a prominent role in the government that might have some effect on the Palestinians (Interior Minister, perhaps) it just might mean that this new government is the same as the old one. In any case, Netanyahu remains in office, leading a party that is explicitly opposed to a two-state solution and has moved to the right. A coalition partner can push the weak-willed Bibi, but Lapid has shown little interest in this issue at all, and to the extent he has, he doesn’t sound much different from Netanyahu. Yachimovitch has stayed away from the entire Palestinian issue and Livni, who engaged it more than any other “centrist” candidate, had turned down a Palestinian offer that included most of East Jerusalem, full capitulation on the right of return and Israel keeping all three of the major settlement blocs. The Palestinians are, as usual, the biggest losers in this election, but that was always a sure thing from the very beginning.
Benjamin Netanyahu: The day Bibi announced that Likud and Avigdor Lieberman’s Yisrael Beiteinu party would run a joint ticket, I said it was a panicked move and a big mistake. I had no idea how big. The combined party has lost 11 seats. The merger was far from the only reason. Likud’s sharp tilt even further to the right, with the accompanying loss of some of its more pragmatic and well-known leaders like Dan Meridor and Benny Begin, chased some of their voters to Lapid. Bennett’s rise allowed some national religious voters to feel they could credibly express that identity in their vote for the first time in years, and that certainly cost Likud Beiteinu. Lieberman’s indictment and the in-fighting within his party certainly didn’t help. Bibi also ran a terrible campaign, one where he almost ignored the budget crisis that prompted his move toward early elections in the first place. In fact, he dealt very little with substantive issues at all, trying to run on slogans and his experience. And the fact is, Israel is facing the same budget cuts it was before and Bibi now has a government that will not share his priorities about where the cuts should come. His obnoxious manner in international affairs will be harder for him to maintain with less of a mandate at home. Every part of this gambit came up snake eyes for Bibi who came into this being sure that no matter what, he would still have his job and today is only barely going to hold on to it. Netanyahu has confirmed his legacy as a weak-willed leader, a venal politician and a poor strategist.
Shelly Yachimovitch/Labor Party: Some will say that Labor was revitalized in this election. Surely Yachimovitch will spin it that way. But this was a big bust. Keep in mind, Kadima had essentially supplanted Labor’s role in Israeli politics. In 2009, Labor won 13 seats, but this was splintered when Barak formed his Atzmaut party, leaving Labor with only eight seats. So, Yachimovitch can claim she doubled Labor’s representation, but that’s nonsense. With Atzmaut disappearing and Kadima either missing the Knesset (which is still possible) or winning only two seats, there was a major opportunity for Labor to regain the center. They finished second, in large measure because Yachimovitch is not an inspiring leader. She has almost nothing to say about security and international issues, which matter to the centrist voters in general. On economic and social issues she has more appeal, but has not proven herself to be a strong leader who can build support for her ideas, nor as someone whose ideas on implementing a social-democratic program are particularly advanced. The election result reflects the lukewarm reaction Yachimovitch produces, as opposed to the charm that Lapid reflected, despite his not having much better ideas than Yachimovitch.
Yisrael Beitienu: Avigdor Lieberman maintained his reputation as a loudmouth by predicting that Likud-Beiteinu would win 40 or more seats in the election. Oops. Lieberman also lost his position as the voice of a “new right” to Naftali Bennett. Still dealing with criminal charges of corruption, Lieberman might yet get a prominent Ministry due to his position as the #2 on the Likud-Beiteinu list, but that is less of a sure thing than that position should imply. Lieberman still holds the Russian community, but his appeal beyond that is diminishing. Yisrael Beiteinu rose to prominence by appealing to the larger right wing. That is receding at a breakneck pace and it will be heading back to being an ethnic party. It won’t disappear, but its days of being the kingmaking party are over.
The Republican Party: Netanyahu’s major setback mirrors, in many ways, the losses the Republicans took in the US in November. Bibi’s party moved further right, and like the GOP, it went further right than mainstream voters wanted. Bibi ran his campaign in a similar way to Mitt Romney’s as well, and it had a similar feel: lots of style, little substance and less reason for those not already beholden to him to vote for him. But most importantly, the whole Netanyahu-neocon-GOP nexus has been rebuked in both countries. The Republicans tried to define themselves as the “pro-Israel” party, but both American Jews and Israelis made it clear that they don’t agree and don’t want to see the issue turned into partisan football. In some ways, that is unfortunate. It would be useful to get rid of the “bipartisan consensus” and have a real debate about the US’ special relationship with Israel. But the GOP attempt to own Israel through its close ally Netanyahu has, at this point, failed.
Photo: A Likud-Beitenu supporter. Credit Pierre Klochendler/IPS.
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