The Bibi Camp got 49.5% of the vote, yet 54% of the seats.

13 Comments / 13 Comments

1. During the last week of the campaign, Shaked insisted on a “broad” Government.. This was incomprehensible for someone allegedly committed to the right.

   In hindsight, it is now obvious, she was being strategic. She was chasing away the right wing voters and hoping to attract centrists from the center/left.

2. @Ted

   Deputy PM defends judge who kept lips sealed during Hatikva
   Justice Salim Joubran silent during singing of national anthem at Grunis swearing-in ceremony

   https://www.timesofisrael.com/israeli-christian-supreme-court-judge-doesnt-sing-hatikva/

   Former Judge Backs Arab Judge Over Israeli Anthem Scandal
   Former Vice President of the Haifa District Court and Religious-Zionist, Menachem Ne’eman, calls Joubran ‘reaonsable,’ says it is obvious that Israeli Arabs cannot identify with the anthem.

   https://www.haaretz.com/2012-03-01/ty-article/former-judge-backs-arab-judge-over-israeli-anthem-scandal/0000017f-db11-d4e1-a57f-fbd53ee50000

3. @Ted

   Basic Law: The Knesset

   Theme:Political Participation
   Status:Active
   Year:1958
   Description:
   An amendment from 1985 added Section 7(A) to the Basic Law: The Knesset, which provides that, “A list of candidates shall not participate in the elections for the Knesset if its aims or actions, expressly or by implication, point to one of the following: (1) denial of the existence of the State of Israel as the state of the Jewish people: (2) denial of the democratic nature of the state; and (3) incitement to racism.” Amendments in 2002 changed Section 7(A)(1) to read as, “denial of the existence of the State of Israel as a Jewish and democratic state” and added Section 7(A)(3), “support for armed struggle by a hostile state or a terrorist organization against the State of Israel.” as an additional basis for disqualifying candidates and candidates’ lists. This law is used to seek to disqualify Arab candidates and political party lists from running in Knesset elections.

   Amendment No. 39 (Candidate who Visited a Hostile State Illegally) (2008) to Article 7A (a1) of The Basic Law: The Knesset denies the right to stand as a candidate for election to the Knesset to any individual who visited Arab and/or Muslim states defined as “enemy states”—such as Syria, Lebanon, Iraq and Iran—without prior permission from the Interior Minister. The law was enacted to deter Arab members of Knesset from travelling to so-called “enemy states.” Amendement 9 enacted 07.08.1985, Amendement 35 enacted 22.05.2002, Amendement 39 enacted 09.07.2008.

   https://www.adalah.org/en/law/view/530

4. I wasn’t aware of any of that.
   Thanks.
   So we don’t need a new law, just the enforcement of the existing law.

5. @Ted Basic Law says anti-Zionist candidates and parties can’t run, right? But the Central Elections Committee has been letting them. I read that this guy won’t stand for Hatikvah because he feels it doesn’t apply to him:

   Justice Salim Joubran is the first Arab Israeli to serve a permanent appointment to the Supreme Court of Israel. He serves as Chairperson of the Central Elections Committee to the 20th Knesset. Prior to his appointment to the Supreme Court, Justice Joubran was a Judge of the District Court and the Magistrate Court in Haifa.

   https://forum-network.org/speakers/justine-salim-joubran/

   About The Central Elections Committee
   The Knesset Central Elections Committee is an official, autonomous, and self-contained body, responsible for the organization, logistics and execution of the general elections for Knesset. The Committee draws its authority from the Knesset Elections Law [combined version] 5729-1969, and as such, the Committee is responsible for the running of a reliable, proper elections process from start to finish, which will allow the Israeli voters to have their say.
   A new Central Elections Committee is formed 60 days after a new Knesset is established following elections, to prepare for the next round of Knesset elections. Heading the Committee is a Supreme Court judge, appointed by the President of the Supreme Court. The Committee is comprised of the Committee presidency, plenum, and the professional staff, headed by the director-general.

   https://forum-network.org/speakers/justine-salim-joubran/

   “autonomous and self-contained” That means they pick each other like the Supreme Court does?

   This is a problem. What is to be done?

6. At the beginning of this conversation, I said:

   If we delete the Arab vote from the anti Bibi Camp then that leaves the anti-Bibi Camp with about 40% compared to 49.5%. That’s more like a mini blowout.

   The problem is that Bennett changed everything by achieving his majority by including Ra’am. So no longer is it enough for the right to dominate the Jewish left, now it has to dominate the Jewish left plus the Arabs.

   If the Arabs get their act together and get a voter turnout % equal to that of the Jews, we are screwed.

   It is imperative that the new government do what is necessary to prevent such an occurrence.

7. @Peloni

   Ayelet Shaked helped raise electoral threshold by 1,400 votes
   Ayelet Shaked promised her voters she’d run to the end – but took pains to ensure that the right-wing bloc would not suffer for her decision….

   …The understanding slowly dawned on Netanyahu that Shaked is what’s called ‘nice to have’ for the right-wing voters who don’t want Netanyahu, can’t stand [Religious Zionism chief MK Bezalel] Smotrich, but have a hard time supporting [National Unity chief Defense Minister Benny] Gantz,” Segal wrote.

   “Suddenly a thought occurred to him: If Shaked drops out, these [voters] will stay home and the electoral threshold will go down.”…

   Shaked then requested guarantees that she would not be attacked by the Likud the day after the elections, and two such guarantees were given to her: The first was a long phone call held on Sunday, two days before the elections, between herself and Likud’s MK Yariv Levin, in which he promised her personally that the Likud would reveal these secret negotiations following the elections…

   https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/362243

8. What Bibi did was maximize the potential vote tally for the Right without Shaked while the Left failed to do the same resulting in a mismatched effort to conserve votes. If they had done so, having more parties, it would, or at least could, have resulted in them winning the election. In a strait-up popular vote, the Arab-Left would still have lost, but only by a margin of ~30K votes. Yet, recall that Shaked’s votes are included in the count for the Right, and her votes might not have voted for any other party on the Right, ie these could have been voters of the Left in some measure, and she had ~57K votes, making the outcome of a head to head vote into a real nail biter.

   I am simply flabbergasted that the Right does not command a greater level of support than this. The Right had a great many advantages in this campaign which should have galvanized their support – the Lebanon gas theft, the wellspring of Arab violence, Gantz’ flooding Samaria with Arab illegal settlements etc.

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9. @Ted

   I don’t know where Haaretz got the info that both Camps got 49.5% of the vote. If true then this election wasn’t a blow out.

   Shockingly, the claim made by Haaretz was correct.

   According to the final results, the right-wing religious alliance of the Likud, Religious Zionism, Shas and United Torah Judaism parties received a total of 2,303,964 votes.

   Combined with the votes received by Jewish Home, which failed to cross the 3.25 percent electoral threshold, the total number of votes cast for all parties which committed to the political bloc of incoming prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu rises to 2,360,757. (Jewish Home leader Ayelet Shaked, formerly of Yamina and the interior minister in the outgoing coalition, pledged during the campaign that she would ally with Netanyahu’s bloc if her new party made it into the Knesset.)

   The eight parties of what might be termed the “anti-Netanyahu bloc” — comprising the outgoing coalition parties, together with the majority Arab Hadash-Ta’al and Balad — attained near-parity, with 2,330,464 vote

   https://www.timesofisrael.com/netanyahu-won-8-seat-majority-over-his-opponents-despite-near-parity-in-raw-votes/

   So the Right garnered only 2,360,757 / (2,360,757 + 2,330,464) = 50.32% of the vote, and this assumes that Shaked’s ~57K votes were Right wing voters, which is clearly in some doubt.
   The Left garnered 2,330,464 / (2,360,757 + 2,330,464) = 49.68% of the vote, and this includes the numbers from the failed Meretz and Balad party’s.

   Consequently, the Haaretz claims are confirmed. This was a strategic victory only which was won on Bibi’s ability to unify the Right, sans Shaked, while the Arab-Left wasted nearly what could have amounted to as many as 7 mandates. Having won exactly 50.3% of the vote and by a margin of only 0.64%, Bibi gained 53.3% of the mandates and has an advantage of an 8 mandate lead over the Arab-Left. As pleasing as this victory stands, the margins could just as easily been bent the other way leaving the Arab-Left in control of the nation. This is a very disturbing reality.

10. Labor Leader Michaeli Blasts Lapid: He Wanted to Erase Us
    ‘The battle was mismanaged,’ says Labor leader Merav Michaeli following the party’s disappointing election results ? Labor source lay blame with Michaeli: ‘She needs to learn lessons’

    Israel’s Labor party leader Merav Michaeli sharply criticized outgoing Prime Minister Yair Lapid for “mismanaging” the center-left bloc campaign while shrugging off responsibility for the demise of the left-wing Meretz party.

    “Lapid wanted to erase the Labor party,” Michaeli said on Thursday in her first public address since election exit polls were published on Tuesday night. She alleged that “Yesh Atid worked against Meretz and against Labor during the entire campaign.”

    Referring to Labor’s “sister-party” Meretz, which failed to pass the electoral threshold required to enter the Knesset, Michaeli said that there was “no political justification for a merger. The battle was mismanaged.” Michaeli said “Whoever managed it did it poorly.”

    Michaeli explained that she had opposed a joint run with Meretz before the election on the grounds that “it could hurt Meretz.” According to her, even if Labor and Meretz were to unite “it would not prevent Netanyahu from forming a government.”

    A source in the party laid the blame with her, saying “The responsibility is on Michaeli. She needs to learn lessons.”

    Labor, a party that once dominated the Knesset, stands just over the 3.25 percent electoral threshold, with four seats.

    Disappointed by exit poll results, Labor canceled a post-election event that was planned to be held in Tel Aviv on Tuesday for the party’s supporters.

    Michaeli said that she sympathizes with the feelings of frustration, disappointment and pain. “Personally, it pains me that I met so many people during the campaign with whom I agreed on what was needed – and then I found out that they believed Lapid needed to be strengthened instead of us.”

    https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/elections/2022-11-03/ty-article/.premium/labor-leader-michaeli-blasts-lapid-he-wanted-to-erase-us/00000184-3ed4-d9a1-a5b5-3fdf7e6f0000

    Israel Elections | Lapid’s Hara-kiri Paved the Way for Netanyahu’s Return
    In the run-up to the Israeli elections, the Yesh Atid leader could have lowered the electoral threshold – thus saving Meretz from extinction – but rejected the proposal…

    The multitude of party slates, the paucity of vote surplus agreements, the refusal to join ranks, the internecine quarrels, the arrogance, the unwarranted euphoria, the megalomania, the lack of recognition for the leader of the bloc – all of these were there from the very start. The conduct of the coalition of change in this campaign was like the Peres government’s handling of the 1996 election campaign (when he faced the political neophyte Netanyahu). A chronicle of a hara-kiri foretold…

    https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/elections/2022-11-03/ty-article/.highlight/lapids-hara-kiri-paved-the-way-for-netanyahus-return/00000184-3a40-d46d-ab96-bafbe4350000

11. @Ted Does it really matter? The popular vote doesn’t matter in US presidential elections either, only the electoral vote. If it mattered, politicians would employ different strategies. The American left tried to use that argument when Trump won and called for abolishing the electoral college. Glad to see they are not doing that in Israel.

12. I don’t know where Haaretz got the info that both Camps got 49.5% of the vote. If true then this election wasn’t a blow out. The victory of the Bibi camp had to do with not wasting any of their votes whereas the anti Bibi camp wasted many votes.

    But maybe I am speaking too quickly. If we delete the Arab vote from the anti Bibi Camp then that leaves the anti-Bibi Camp with about 40% compared to 49.5%. That’s more like a mini blowout.

    I am waiting to read an official announcement about what percentage of the total votes went to the Bibi Camp.

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13. It is now being reported on JPOST that Shaked’s decision to run was coordinated with Likud per MK Yoav Kish who claims that Shaked wasn’t promised anything in return but forgiveness for doing so.

    Likud and Shaked each dismissed this claim, but Shaked goes on to state

    “out of responsibility for the right bloc, I talked with Yariv Levin and made sure that in case we do not pass the electoral threshold, the run will not harm the right bloc. Levin clarified that running is not at all harmful to the bloc, but the opposite.”

    Following Kish’s statement to JPOST, Likud ordered its members to stop giving interviews.