Israel Early Elections Update: The Bad, The Good, The (Formerly) Criminal
Earlier this week (while many of the Diaspora's Orthodox and haredi Jews were still too drunk to notice), Israel's right wing prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu called for early Knesset elections that his coalition is expected to win. The exact date of the elections has not yet been announced.
Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu
Netanyahu supposedly called early elections now because the Likud Party he heads and its political allies are projected to win a strong majority.
However, I think that analysis is flawed.
Hours before Netanyahu called the new elections, word leaked that Netanyahu's haredi coalition partner United Torah Judaism (UTJ) was about to split into two (or perhaps even three) separate parties, leaving Netanyahu with the very real possibility that one, tow (or even three) of these new parties would fail to get enough votes to meet the minimum threshold for electing a member to Knesset. While this arguably would be good for Israel, it would be bad for Netanyahu, who relies on UTJ to keep his current coalition in power.
At about the same time that the expected UTJ split(s) leaked, word also leaked that Rabbi Ovadia Yosef had approved the return of Aryeh Deri to the leadership of the Sefardi haredi Shas political party.
Deri is perhaps the most talented politician in the country behind Netanyahu. But he is also a convicted felon who served time in prison for accepting bribes and public corruption.
Despite that, Deri has a real chance to become prime minister in the future, something Netanyahu would probably like to prevent because Deri has shown a willingness to work with and support parties to left of Likud. Worse than that for Netanyahu, if Deri handles his return well, he would be a credible challenger to Netanyahu sooner rather than later.
But calling elections now make a Deri return less likely to smooth, and it might even delay it by a a year or two, which also benefits Netanyahu.
At the same time, these snap elections might prevent UTJ from splintering.
Even if UTJ stays unified, if Likud and its non-haredi allies gain a significant number of seats, UTJ's power should shrink.
What will happen?
Who knows.
Time – the exact amount has not yet been specified – will tell.
For those of you so inclined, Israel Hayom has a good breakdown of Israel's various political parties and the current number of seats each has in the Knesset.
Despite that, Deri has a real chance to become prime minister in the future,
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???
his chances to become the prime minister of Israel are good as his chances to become the President of the USA
Posted by: Bassy the Haredi Slayer | October 10, 2012 at 01:13 PM
Sure, Deri could be Prime Minister if he can manage to survive a week without being indicted.
Posted by: Baruch Shelo Asani Haredi | October 10, 2012 at 01:31 PM
Yassir, that's my Bibi.
Posted by: Office of the Chief Rabbi | October 10, 2012 at 01:41 PM
On September 27 the Likud court ordered the convening of the Central Committee no later than November 30th. There have been appeals to this court from numerous sources since May. In the ruling the court mentioned the importance of convening the newly elected body (which, constitutionally, must be convened within 30 days of the publication of the election results) due to "the real probibility of early elections." This wouldn't have happened if the early elections wasn't already a done deal waiting to be announced.
Projected date of elections reported to be February 12, 2013.
Posted by: Maskil | October 10, 2012 at 02:36 PM
Another byproduct of the early elections will be the rise of labor and the fall of kadima - the realignment on the left may make it easier to make a coalition as labor is less power hungry at this point than kadima.
Posted by: Name Withheld | October 10, 2012 at 03:01 PM
Shmarya, I hate to break it to you, but it's not all about charedim. (To a hammer, everything is a nail.) In fact, none of the reports in Israeli media come close to suggesting what you did- that a, or the, major consideration in Netanyahu's mind is internal charedi politics. There's the budget, Kadimah, who knows what else. No charedim, sorry.
By the way:
1. The UTJ always splits (and then reunites) right before an election. I think it's a legal thing, but also a way to reopen who gets what.
2. Charedim love talking about their gedolim, but never listen to them. Shas has been run by years for people other than Deri, who will ignore (or explain away) Ovadia Yosef if he tells them different. At least they're not as corrupt as him, even if they're bad for Israel.
Posted by: Nachum | October 11, 2012 at 04:22 AM