Israeli General Election: April 9, 2019

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Bibi offering the education and housing ministries to JH-NU if they agree to run wiht Otzma. that's a big treat for them. He seems paniced, and he should be, that's his only way to get a coalition to support him under indictment.

Meanwhile Ganz and Lapid are stepping up the gear in their merger talks.  interesting day ahead

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New Right's top 15 Knesset slate:
1 Naftali Bennett
2 Ayelet Shaked
3 Alona Barkat
4 Matan Kahana
5 Shuli Moalem
6 Caroline Glick
7 Elyashiv Reichner
8 Uri Shechter
9 Amihai Chikli
10 Shirley Pinto
11 Yomtob Kalfon
12 Ron Bar-Yoshafat
13 Roni Sasover
14 Moshe Peled
15 Yochai Ezra

Yisrael Beytenu's top 10 on its Knesset slate:
1. Avigdor Liberman
2. Oded Forer
3. Yevgeny Suba
4. Eli Avidar
5. Yulia Malinovsky
6. Hamad Amar
7. Alex Kushnir
8. Mark Ifraimov
9. Limor Magen Telem
10. Elina Bardoch-Yalov

And for the sh**tvoters:

https://twitter.com/RaoulWootliff/status/1098177654908485632

New Right has very little to offer, it's personal votes for B&S and moderate religious zionists.

YB is really on the verge of the threshold, I assume Liberman just aims for the Russian base now

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Tibi did make it an issue that Arab parties should be move involved in government here. We can see some confidence and supply with Ganz to see him hit 61.

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What are the chances on a debate involving the major candidates?

Slim. Bibi is the better orator but he also knows the image matters and Ganz has a good 10’’ on him

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Can New Right support Gantz, if for example Bibi will be indicted?

No.

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Can New Right support Gantz, if for example Bibi will be indicted?

No.

Of course they can. The whole point of the New Right is to form a plausible right wing heir to Bibi, and supporting an indicted right wing nemesis to prop him up is not exactly a slam dunk. I do think they'd prefer Bibi if the mandates are there for a right wing majority, but it's not a simple calculation.

It is. They can’t support him or they’ll be done with their electorate and one of them would like to succeed Bibi which won’t happen if they crown Gantz

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Some things:

- I think this poll confirms what I've been thinking for a while: Netanyahu still has an easier path to form a government than Gantz, but the gap between the "blocs" has been tightening. This is probably because Blue and White attracted a number of voters worth 1-3 seats from Likud directly following the merger with YA. These could of course be all sorts of voters, but I think Blue and White might be attractive to voters from the former Soviet Union in particular. Most of them will of course still vote for Likud but if enough of them jump ship to Blue and White this might determine the outcome of the election.

- The right bloc depends on a higher number of parties hovering around the threshold: Kulanu, Shas, YB. If even one doesn't make it in, that could have important consequences. And I would even include URWP here, polling at 5-7 seats. It's worth remembering that Yachad were actually in according to all the pre-2015 GE polls. Among the DL public there is now an extreme and imo false sense that URWP are safe, which is probably based on earlier polls that had them at 8-10 seats. I've seen people advertise Zehut using this argument

- The pre-2015 polls were pretty good but overestimated ZU by ~2-3 seats and underestimated Likud by that same amount or more, even taking into account the fact that polls aren't predictions and that Likud had strong momentum during the polling blackout and on e-day: the exit polls had this bias too. ZU were leading Likud in all the polls. I'm not sure if the pollsters have revised their methodology, and we can't discard the possibility that there is, again, a shy Likud vote out there.

- The biggest unknown is obviously the electoral and political effect of a Netanyahu indictment.

In any case, Gantz can't really get a majority coalition until there's a mass exodus of Likud voters to Blue and White so that he wins, in combination with Labour (that has to stay at about double-digits), Meretz and Kulanu\Gesher 60 seats. That'd require roughly 40 seats for Gantz-Lapid, 10 for Labour, 5 for Meretz and 5 for Gesher or Kulanu, whoever passes the threshold. Fantasy scenario if I ever saw one. Otherwise, it's a minority government supported by the "moderate" Arabs, something many Israelis see as problematic.

Exactly, and Netanyahu needs to campaign on this in the second phase of his campaign once the "Gantz is left and weak" mantra he is currently pushing has been ingrained in people's minds.

In this scenario it's new elections or PM Gantz leading a national unity government. Bibi is sitting at 60 or 61 seats right now, which simply won't get him a coalition. And there are literally no other partners conceivably available to him. I'm not saying that Gantz has an easy path, but if he finishes 6 or 7 sears ahead of Likud he'll either be able to bring Likud on board or else simply see new elections. The point is that finishing several seats behind Gantz and only getting 61 mandates virtually ensures that Bibi will not be PM from these elections. A lot can change. And maybe he'll do better with new elections. But right now I don't see how he actually hangs on.

If Ganz gets 3+ more seats than Likud it would be almost illegitimate to allow Likud to form a government and there would be a lot of pressure of Kulanu to accept the popular will

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Labour, Meretz are petitioning the Election Commission led by High Court Justice Melcer to ban Otzma from taking part in the election. The reason would be that Michael Ben-Ari, who is at #5 on the URWP list, was a co-founder of Rabbi Meir Kahane's Jewish Idea yeshiva. If this happens, which I doubt, it would prove that the country's institutions moved to the left, given that Ben-Ari was in the Knesset from 2009-13 already.

No one is going to get banned, and it's not going to change. Though I would state that there is a difference between denying the Jewish element than denying the democratic element. If there would be a majority that doesn't want a Jewish state there's no point at keeping it Jewish against popular wishes, and a party saying that it would prefer a neutral state are merely saying what they would espouse as a majority, there's no call for violence.

Denying the democratic element is in part a denial of a majority rule in itself. It entails violence as it says regardless of what the majority want theses are the policies we will advocate even needed than by force (as the democratic majority is insignificant as is).

so all though I'm against disqualifying either, again the analogy between the extreme right and the far left is unsound.

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No one is getting disqualified, it’s a political stunt.

Alarmingly the JH-NU agreement with Otzma states they will help pick Ben Ari as the opposition representative in the judicial appointment committee. That will be appalling for so many reasons

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Indictment decision in the coming days. That will shake everything

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No one is getting disqualified, it’s a political stunt.

Alarmingly the JH-NU agreement with Otzma states they will help pick Ben Ari as the opposition representative in the judicial appointment committee. That will be appalling for so many reasons

Not sure how many people are on that committee, but this doesn't seem bad to me - it's well and truly time for a change here, and the left-wing response shows how they think they are still entitled to "own" the courtrooms with their judges when they can't even win an election. Wouldn't Ben-Gvir be the more effective one here, though, given his legal background?

Another thing to remember is that that B&W could be lying about the Grand Coalition. Their entire proposal this election will be that they are the sensible ones - not supporting Arabs, not supporting Jewist Authoritarians, and not running an indicted candidate. Giving Likud a bear hug coalition-wise say "we're just Likud, but less questionable" to the Likud voters they need to win. Then if the option is available, after obtaining the Likud votes at the polls, they go seak Meretz/Labor support rather than Likud.

This would be possible, I suppose, but the door to cooperation with the Arab parties does seem to be more firmly closed (though never say never, particularly in Israel...) and it seems rather unrealistic that Blue and White get to 61 with only Labour, Meretz and centrists. Though this, too, is possible if Likud voters leave in droves after a Netanyahu indictment. But I wouldn't count on any of these things.

David, all the politicians in the committee the past for years were from the right. It's not a matter of left\right it the fact that this are deplorable people who are quasi member in terrorist organizations.

Now I assume you never really spent time in Israeli courts, but the majority in magistrate and district  courts is right wing and they're at least half of the supreme court.

Right wing arguments against the judicial system that aren't based on facts should be known from now on as the Straw Boogeyman

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https://twitter.com/RaoulWootliff/status/1100818653426130944

Here we go boys!

Rubbish. 2000 is the easiest bribe case of them all. He’s also rumored to consider not publishing any of the materials until the election. What a soft and pathetic AG

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In the meantime I hope we still believe and support women...

I do, but I honestly don’t see why something that happened with teen Gantz in the early 70’s is interesting. And I don’t even like him.

Labour’s new toy, Rosso, on the other hand...

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In the meantime I hope we still believe and support women...

I do, but I honestly don’t see why something that happened with teen Gantz in the early 70’s is interesting. And I don’t even like him.

Labour’s new toy, Rosso, on the other hand...

What about him?

Also the woman should obviously be heard out but it seems to me like the accusations against Schumer/Bobby Scott/Booker so far. Very political in language and source. We'll see.

Has a long history of frivolous conduct with his 19 year old secretaries. Or so I’ve heard

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One thing I find interesting about Israeli politics is that it seems like Anglo progressives' politics map onto the left-Arab bloc much more smoothly than Anglo conservatives' politics to the right-Religious bloc. I'm having hard time trying to decide who to support. I can't vote for a corrupt party or an indicted leader given all my complaints about Justin Trudeau without being hypocritical. UTJ is also out because some of their Haredi policies really don't mesh well with Christianity.

I guess I would be a Kulanu-New Right swing voter right now. Would that be ridiculous in Israel or would it kind of make sense?

Makes sense, a lot of ‘religious light’ type swing between them

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Agreed. As a right-winger I'm just too worried that it all turns out to be a ploy and Meretz are suddenly in the government as Gantz' junior partners instead of Likud. I'm okay with a two-state solution but it has to be negotiated by people that I trust to be genuinely patriotic, who truly have Israelis' interests in mind and are not "soft". And I think this is a position a lot of Israelis have - which, rightly or wrongly, is part of the reason Gantz' strategy (the militaristic videos, the Likud bearhug) seems successful while Herzog's wasn't.

The above outlined argument does make me contemplate supporting Kulanu, with the idea that they would do the right thing and support a constructive grand coalition if necessary and not impede a 2SS on the one hand, but they would also not enter or support a government with Meretz (or even one depending on Tibi and Odeh) on the other hand.

Meretz will marginalized in any such government and will only get social ministries

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Akiva Novick had an interesting take on this, claiming that the right bloc isn't actually down in the polls percentage-wise from the day the Knesset was dissolved - it is just that more of the right-wing vote ends up under the threshold. Most polls have YB not making it in, Zehut at 2-3% and Gesher usurping 2-3% too.

https://twitter.com/EylonALevy/status/1100696049927241728
Not sure what he did with Kulanu here, though, who are very clearly down from their 2015 result.

Also interesting that the Maagar Mochot poll for Israel Hayom on March 1 found that 58% of Blue and White voters voted for ZU in 2015, 17% voted for Kulanu, 13% voted for the Joint List (!) and 10% voted for Likud. All in all still at least a 27% vote transfer from center-right and right-wing parties. Of course, a lot of these Kulanu voters indicated that they would vote for Yesh Atid before Gantz entered the race and were already "lost" to the right in the polls on the day the Knesset dissolved.

I thought that was clear...Meretz and Labour are polling higher because of the threshold. That’s why I expect the threshold to be lowered next time around

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With Bennet, Kachlon, and Levy Abkasis all against a Bibi indictment government his days are numbered either way it seems

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Who is the highest non-Jew on the Blue and White list?

Who is the highest non-Jew on the Labor list?

Druze news anchorwoman Gadeer Mreeh at #25 for Blue and White; Gavri Barjil (judging by the name...) at #14 for Labour.

It’s bargil, and he’s a Kibbutznik

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Is there any good polling of party support by income, education, or socioeconomic status? If not, could someone provude some broad strokes? Or are the differences comparatively trivial due to the dominance of non-tax and spend issues?

As a general rule Likud is the bastion of the poorer, especially Mizrahi working class who live in the area in Israel called the Periphery, which is pretty much anything outside of the wealthy and liberal "Center."  Labor is the party of the Ashkenazi upper class. However Yesh Atid with its emphasis on liberal economics and secularism has actually taken a big bite out of that apple. Meretz is the young people's party, especially in Tel Aviv and in liberal parts of Jerusalem (what few there are).

Older voters tend to be more faithful to the Labor Party of their youth. A lot of people say that young people are more likely to be on the right in Israel , but that's not actually true. Young voters are incredibly polarized, with many being strongly secular liberals who prefer a democratic euro-state, and the others being a very religious group that prefers a Jewish ethno-religious state. The truth, though, is that young voters in Israel are probably some of the most disengaged and disenchanted in the world. They are as a whole very secular and liberal on social and religious issues, but are probably more to the right on security issues. There is also a growing Haredi demographic that is, well, Haredi. There is also a growing demographic of ex-Haredi young people that are fairly anti-Haredi.

Politics is mostly about cultural and ideological identity, though. Labor is fairly centrist for a Labor party, economically,amd Likud is fairly centrist for a new economically liberal party. So there are not huge fissures on those issues. The big questions are really over the Palestinian question and,  perhaps even more than what, the degree to which Israel's democratic character should outweigh, if at all, its Jewish character. There are major issues with religion, race, and culture buries in there, which is why politics are so volatile here.

Inaccurate, there are actually some good researches but they're are all in hebrew.

as divided by deciles:
1-4 mainly Arab parties and Haredi as they are the poorest voters
5-7 Likud, YB, Kachlon and others are the majority (JH also has a good showing here but it was almost equal to Labour's).
8-10 Meretz Labour YA and such are more dominant here, though Likud has a good showing here as well.

In general Likud gets the broadest support in most towns by deciles as it is the closest to a broad tent party in Israel.

Though there is a correlation with economic standing, the causal relation is one of education\religiousness\ethnicity, the more educated a voter is the more likely he is to vote left (though JH has a strong showing as well as their elite mirrors the left elite). The more secular a voter is the more left wing he is (with YB as the outlier). And, voters from Ashkenaz background are more left wing (again with UTJ and JH having a good showing).

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Let me just note to everyone in this thread- the Druze hate it when you identify them as Arabs. They consider themselves distinct and their own minority in Israel.

that's an exaggeration. The Druze have a variety of positions within them and some are pro-arab (Hadash had 2 druze MKs, one of which was Mohammad Nafaa)

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In some late-breaking list action, Pinchas Idan, the former head of the Israel Airports Authority union, who won 19th spot on the Likud slate and was a close ally of Welfare Minister MK Haim Katz, was disqualified by the Supreme Court today for having held a state job too recently. It's too late to replace him in his slot, which was one of the ones reserved for regional candidates, so everybody at the 20th spot and up gets to move up one spot. Likud is currently polling at an average of 29 seats in the Knesset Jeremy average, so this move works to replace Idan with Michal Shir (an ally of Gideon Saar and representative of the Tel Aviv region).

On this note, because the lists are set, disqualifying a candidate just bumps everyone who's below them on the list up a level, right? So if Ben-Ari is disqualified even as the remainder of the Otzma representatives are allowed to run, Ben-Gvir would be bumped to 7th on their list, not 5th -- which isn't impossible, but is a fairly tall order. It would mean Otzma is likelier not to be represented than to be represented in the next Knesset.

Edit: I do enjoy that Netanyahu's last-minute efforts to unite small right-wing parties seem to have totally failed; in the Kan poll released today, there are no less than seven right-wing parties who have a level of support between 2% and 5% (note the threshold is at 3.25%): from top to bottom, Shas, Kulanu, the United Right, the New Right, Zehut, Yisrael Beiteinu, and Gesher all fit into this category. Bad luck with the threshold for the right looks like the only way for Blue & White to plausibly form a government without Likud; would be deeply amusing if this is the ultimate result of Lieberman's Law.

The threshold is a market entry barrier, they implemented it to screw the Arabs so it only serves them that their non liberal policy blew up in their face.

Bibi always fantasized about a large Israeli 'republican party' swallowing all those little parties around him. so he might push for this after the election if he's still afloat

[Hnv1]

In some late-breaking list action, Pinchas Idan, the former head of the Israel Airports Authority union, who won 19th spot on the Likud slate and was a close ally of Welfare Minister MK Haim Katz, was disqualified by the Supreme Court today for having held a state job too recently. It's too late to replace him in his slot, which was one of the ones reserved for regional candidates, so everybody at the 20th spot and up gets to move up one spot. Likud is currently polling at an average of 29 seats in the Knesset Jeremy average, so this move works to replace Idan with Michal Shir (an ally of Gideon Saar and representative of the Tel Aviv region).

On this note, because the lists are set, disqualifying a candidate just bumps everyone who's below them on the list up a level, right? So if Ben-Ari is disqualified even as the remainder of the Otzma representatives are allowed to run, Ben-Gvir would be bumped to 7th on their list, not 5th -- which isn't impossible, but is a fairly tall order. It would mean Otzma is likelier not to be represented than to be represented in the next Knesset.

Edit: I do enjoy that Netanyahu's last-minute efforts to unite small right-wing parties seem to have totally failed; in the Kan poll released today, there are no less than seven right-wing parties who have a level of support between 2% and 5% (note the threshold is at 3.25%): from top to bottom, Shas, Kulanu, the United Right, the New Right, Zehut, Yisrael Beiteinu, and Gesher all fit into this category. Bad luck with the threshold for the right looks like the only way for Blue & White to plausibly form a government without Likud; would be deeply amusing if this is the ultimate result of Lieberman's Law.

Is there any particular reason why the Arabs formed joint lists to protect themselves from losing all their seats while the small right wing parties did not?

Arab voters are more desperate.
between all those parties that aren't that many possible alliances, and there's too much ego.

Gesher and Kulano could have merged but ego
YB isn't fit to merge with any of those. Or Zehut for the matter.
Shas could only reasonably merge with UTJ.
And the New Right could work with any of those.

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Regarding Shas, and this is probably a dumb and slightly roundabout question - they always get described as a Haredi party. But to what extent is that actually the case? I mean, I was under the impression that their electorate was as much traditionalist and based around Mizrahi identity as much as anything else? And aren't the Haredi movements something that is much more Ashkenazi?

The actual leadership has always been exclusively haredi. However, back when Shas were getting 17 seats, most of their electorate was non haredi. These days though with their 5-6 seats they have lost most their non haredi voters so now most of their voters are haredi. The Ashkenazi haredi have their own party (UTJ), with has being the party of Mizrahi Haredi.

There are a few non Haredi voters left, but they’re the black Kippa type from the periphery

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Lol, so according to that poll in the (unlikely) event of a grand coalition, Hadash-Taal would be the official opposition?

I wonder how Israelis would react to the Arab party being the opposition.

No they won’t. The opposition leader is picked by the majority of opposition MKs, in that case I assume all the Jews will team up behind someone