The campaign for the election of February 10 is far enough along to risk some commentary.
Benyamin Netanyahu's Likud is holding a lead with a projected 28-30 seats in the Knesset; Tzipi Livni's Kadima cannot seem to rise above 21-24 seats; and Ehud Barak's Labor is stuck in the range of 15-17 seats.
There are 120 seats in the Knesset. Kadima currently has 29 seats, Likud 12 seats, and Labor 18.
Reinforcing the polls were phone-in responses to the three leading candidates' appearance on television. Netanyahu came in first, Livni second, and Barak third. A query on a popular web site found 73 percent of 44,000 respondents indicating that they would not vote for Livni.
Along with Likud, the high flyer is Avigdor Lieberman's Israel our Home. It has 11 seats in the present Knesset, and is showing as many as 18 in the polls. Lieberman may be taking votes from Netanyahu.
The electorate has moved to the right. Persistent rocket and mortar attacks on southern towns and the Gaza operation have done their work. Israelis are thinking about national defense, and the leading parties emphasize the subject.
Netanyahu refuses to divide Jerusalem, and promises that he will not allow Iran to acquire a nuclear weapon. Lieberman has sought to outlaw one of the Arab parties; he says that Arabs who do not demonstrate their loyalty to Israel should lose their citizenship; and has proposed transferring to Palestine areas of Israel with large Arab populations.
The Obama presidency may be making its contribution to the shift rightward. Israel was a lone outpost of support for George W. Bush, and is expecting a change in the messages coming from Washington. The media chart the appointments the new president has made in fields that concern Israel. Some Israelis may be reading the commentary from "well placed" Americans--often Jews--who are urging the administration to get tough with a country that has come to rely on unquestioned American support, and has not bothered to offer the Palestinians anything worthwhile. (See, for example, http://www.newsweek.com/id/177716)
The media has not be kind to either Netanyahu or Lieberman. It labels Netanyahu as unreliable, and Lieberman as beyond the pale. We have seen comparisons of Netanyahu's statements of past years with what he claims he said, as well as his earlier predictions and promises that never came to pass.
Among the questions raised concerning his previous term as prime minister are, Did he, or didn't he send an emissary to Damascus to promise that Israel would withdraw completely from the Golan? And what prompted him to concede large sections of Hebron to Palestinian control?
The whopper in his career is the claim that he was offered the finance ministry of Italy due to his success in reforming the Israeli economy. We are also hearing that he authored a book, which is printed, but will not be released until after the election. Speculation is that the book describes his actions in cutting welfare payments, which might get in the way of what he is now promising one of his potential coalition partners.
There are positive and negative sides to Netanyahu's reputation. The obvious negative is that voters cannot have the foggiest idea what they will get from Prime Minister Netanyahu, other than inspiring declarations of what he will do and what he has done. The positive side is that he is unlikely to be as destructive to a good relationship with America or Europe as his campaign suggests.
His rhetorical record is disturbing, but he has waffled under pressure in the direction of pragmatism. He will disappoint his most enthusiastic supporters, but provide them with fine sounding claims of steadfast consistency.
Israel's election, and the American election will provide yet additional opportunities to examine the "great leader" conception of history. Expectations of Obama are unsurpassed. Netanyahu may not be in his league, but he is as close as any Israeli.
Both of them will face profound challenges to what they have promised. Obama's come from the economic crisis, as well as from the perennial problems of the world's leader fixing all those problems in its far flung responsibilities. When the problems are interconnected, the chances of scoring high on any one of them is especially problematic. Israel is in a complex of issues for the United States that also includes Iraq, Afghanistan, the West Bank, Gaza, Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia and oil. Each of those places, as well as Israel,has its own politics, and each is likely to resist any effort of the United States (or anyone else) to dictate an optimal solution. Palestine has vaporized into the contending West Bank and Gaza, and has made this corner of America's constituency even more troubling. It is not the time for outsiders to deal with Palestinians when they are talking nasty to one another, and occasionally killing one another.
Netanyahu has some credits on his record. He led a reform of Israeli social programs which reduced welfare payments below the level where they were threatening economic viability. Despite his claims, however, he did not produce all by himself the years of prosperity.
Israel is a small country, with an economy that responds as much to what happens outside as to what its government decides. Its government, like many others, can exercise a veto over what the United States demands, but it had better not exercise that veto too often, or too explicitly.
I welcome comments sent to my e-mail address below.
Ira Sharkansky (Emeritus)
Dept of Political Science
The Hebrew University of Jerusalem
msira@mscc.huji.ac.il
Tel: +972-2-532-2725
Fax: +972-2-582-9144