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David Dreilinger and IPF Staff is a not-for-profit, nonpartisan organization with a singular purpose: to support active and sustained American efforts aimed at resolving the conflict between Israel and its Arab neighbors.
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By David Dreilinger and IPF Staff
March 30, 2006
Ehud Olmert's Kadima party emerged from Tuesday's Knesset elections with a victory, winning 28 out of the 120 seats in the Knesset. Amir Peretz's Labor party made a strong second place showing with 20, while Binyamin Netanyahu's Likud -- languishing in fifth place with 11 seats [now tied for third place in final vote tally - ii] -- was left, in the words of Likud Member of Knesset Dan Naveh, to some "very profound soul-searching." The election surprise came with Avigdor Lieberman's right-wing Yisrael Beiteinu party capturing 12 seats [now 11] to become the fourth-largest party in the Knesset, winning more votes than the Likud [no longer true-ii], and with the Pensioners Party coming from nowhere to take 7 seats.
The Kadima victory was by no means preordained. With the party's founder, Ariel Sharon, felled by a massive stroke and Hamas coming to power next door, a Kadima collapse might easily have occurred. It could have gone the way of the other upstart "centrist" parties in Israel's history that petered out by the time Election Day rolled around, or shortly after being elected, like Dash in 1977 or the Center party in 1999. But Kadima's real political appeal -- as a non-ideological centrist party -- together with its plan to withdraw from most of the West Bank [the name the Arab world and other non-Jews favor for Judea and Samaria, Israel's Biblical heartland-ii], proved to be enough to propel Olmert into the Prime Minister's chair and ensure that Kadima will remain strong.
Olmert gambled when he revealed his plan to unilaterally withdraw from most of the West Bank in the middle of his election campaign. Such a detailed policy proposal was unheard of in the midst of a campaign, especially by the frontrunner, and many pundits wondered if his forthrightness on what was perceived to be such a controversial issue would cost him on election day.
As it turned out, Israel's withdrawal from much of the West Bank isn't that controversial after all. In fact, some commentators have suggested that many Israelis accepted the eventual withdrawal as a fait accompli and even lost interest in it, choosing to vote for parties like Labor and the Pensioners that pledged to deal with socioeconomic issues. Assuming that a withdrawal was inevitable, supporters redirected their votes to smaller parties where they thought their vote would make a bigger difference. All too many didn't vote at all; the election had the lowest turnout in Israeli history.
Accordingly, even though Olmert did not win the commanding victory some expected, the voters handed him a mandate for his "convergence plan." Together with Labor -- which supports negotiations and withdrawal from Palestinian areas -- and other small parties, there is a clear majority in the Knesset in support of Olmert's plan. With less than 50 (of 120) Knesset members opposed to further withdrawals, the right does not have the strength to form a blocking majority against it. As Nahum Barnea pointed out in Yediot Ahronoth, Olmert "turned these elections into a referendum on the future of the West Bank." And Israelis voted to disengage the territories' future from Israel's.
Election Surprises
It seems that in every Israeli election cycle one party manages to tap into a previously unrepresented stream of public opinion and defy expectations by winning a large number of seats in the Knesset.
In the 2003 elections that party was Shinui, led by the charismatic Tommy Lapid. Shinui managed to channel the widespread frustration among secular Israelis with the growing influence of religious parties into 15 Knesset seats, becoming the third largest party in the Knesset.
It is now clear that Shinui's rise was a flash-in-the-pan event. After failing to follow through on its campaign promises and beset by corruption scandals and political infighting, the party broke apart three years after its electoral success and didn't manage to win a single seat in the current Knesset. But in this election, there were two other parties to address frustrated voters' concerns: Avigdor Lieberman's Yisrael Beiteinu party and the Pensioners.
Lieberman, who immigrated from the Soviet Union in the 1970s, would like to see a Jewish state with as few Arabs in it as possible. To accomplish this goal he advocates transferring Israeli Arab villages on the June 1967 border to Palestinian sovereignty in exchange for annexing Jewish settlements, a farfetched idea that is overwhelmingly rejected by the Israeli Arabs themselves.
Many Israelis consider Lieberman's policy to be racist and extreme. Kadima member Shimon Peres puts in this way: "It's unthinkable for Israel to engage in ethnic cleansing and expel Israeli Arabs... there's no room for savagery in international relations." That's why Lieberman's party usually appealed only to right-wing voters from the Former Soviet Union and kept him, in the past, as a candidate of the fringe.
But he received support from other sectors of the population in these elections. Exit polls indicate that between one-third and one-half of his support came from veteran Israelis, and he now heads the [second] largest faction on the right, with more seats than the Likud and more seats than a combination of the National Religious Party and the ultra-hardline National Union party, which won nine.
In any case, it seems unlikely -- though not impossible -- that Yisrael Beiteinu will join the coalition, and it will probably head the opposition forces of the right.
The other surprise party in this election was the Pensioners. Organized around the simple principle of maintaining pensions and services for the elderly -- with, as of yet, no larger political or economic program -- the party won an impressive seven seats in the Knesset. A vote for the pensioners became a trendy protest vote for young Israelis, particularly in Tel Aviv. It was a protest not only against the political system as a whole, but a protest against the cuts to social services enacted by former Finance Minister Binyamin Netanyahu that exacerbated the situation of Israel's elderly. Because the Pensioners' demands are relatively straightforward and easy to meet, and because many in the party appear to support unilateral disengagement, they will likely make their way into Olmert's coalition in the coming weeks.
What Now?
Under Olmert's leadership Israel will complete the separation barrier and, if the new Hamas government proves as intractable as everyone suspects it will be, could prepare for another unilateral withdrawal.
This is a revolutionary change -- a real centrist party has become the largest in the Knesset and it has pledged to lead Israel out of most of the West Bank. Voter turnout may have been down, but that does not change the fact that this was one of the most significant elections Israel has seen in years.
After 39 years, a plan for the disposition of the West Bank was actually put on the table by a candidate for prime minister and made the centerpiece of his platform. That plan has now been endorsed by the electorate. Ehud Olmert is now the first prime minister ever to have a mandate for ending an occupation that, more and more, is viewed as an obstacle not only to peace but to Israel being "a country that is fun to live in," to quote Olmert himself.
There can be no doubt that the new Prime Minister will use his anti-occupation mandate.
Views expressed by the author do not
necessarily reflect those of israelinsider.
 
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