RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Coronavirus-and-Israeli-electoral-ills-619929

It is unclear which achievement will come first: the formation of a solid, right-leaning government, or the coronavirus vaccine that dedicated, innovative Israeli scientists are busily developing.

The biggest news in the Jewish state this week should have surrounded the Knesset elections. Instead, it focused on a different cause for mass hysteria: the coronavirus pandemic.

Yes, while 16 people in Israel out of a population of nine million are suffering from what all report to be mild-to-moderate cold-like symptoms, the rest of the country is gradually being subjected to home isolation, increasingly stringent directives aimed at preventing the spread of the contagious flu, and panic-inducing warnings about the death toll certain to come.It’s one way to alleviate the nausea induced by the ills of the political system. After all, it was the third time in less than a year that we Israelis were called upon to go the polls. The first two hadn’t worked out so well where coalition-building was concerned.

The nationwide hope, laced with pessimism, was that Monday’s vote would put an end to the deadlock. The only question was which bloc – that of Prime Minister Benjamin (Bibi) Netanyahu, leader of Likud, or that of Blue and White chairman Benny Gantz – was going to garner enough mandates to establish a stable majority government.

Though the months following the September election were relatively sleepy from a campaign perspective – with a weary public loath to going through the whole process yet again – renewed energy entered the scene a couple of weeks ago, when Netanyahu suddenly surged in the polls.

https://pjmedia.com/trending/netanyahu-at-the-cusp-of-a-dramatic-comeback/

Israel went to the polls on Monday. By Tuesday morning, as vote-counting proceeded, it appeared all but certain that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, his Likud Party, and his right-wing bloc had scored a dramatic comeback victory.

First it will help to recap.

Netanyahu was prime minister from 1996 to 1999, and again consecutively from 2009 to 2019, winning elections in 2009, 2013, and 2015. When he ran again in April 2019, it seemed he’d won again handily as the right-wing bloc took 65 seats out of Israel’s 120-member Knesset (to win you need 61).

But something happened on the way to coalition-forming. Avigdor Liberman, head of a secular-hawkish faction, demanded that Netanyahu stop making concessions to two ultra-religious parties that had been part of his coalition since 2015.

It was a demand Netanyahu had to refuse, since his ultra-religious coalition parties held far more seats than Liberman’s faction, which had won all of five seats. But when Liberman pulled out of the coalition, it was left with 60 seats—one short of the 61-seat minimum. Israel has been in electoral limbo ever since.

Especially because in the September 2019 elections, Netanyahu’s right-wing bloc—sans Lieberman’s faction—slipped even further to 55 seats. Netanyahu’s main challenger, former chief of staff Benny Gantz, led his centrist Blue and White party to an impressive performance—but his bloc, like Netanyahu’s, fell way short of 61 mandates. (If you’re wondering about the arithmetic, the remaining mandates went to the Joint List, an Israeli Arab party that’s hostile to Israel as a Jewish state and not grist for anyone’s coalition.)

https://www.jns.org/opinion/is-netanyahus-significant-victory-suff

Keeping in mind that the results of Israel’s Knesset elections are not final, the tally indicates that the attempt to oust Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has failed abysmally. It remains to be seen whether his party’s victory on Monday means that his bloc has enough of a majority to form a government. While the initial numbers were encouraging—with Likud outnumbering its key rival, Blue and White by four mandates and the right-wing bloc surpassing the left-wing block by five—throughout Tuesday’s ongoing vote count and verification, the picture continued to fluctuate. By late afternoon, it appeared that Netanyahu’s victory was amazing, but not sufficient.

The significance of this election—the third in less than a year—lies in its elements of surprise. In the first place, voter turnout reached 71 percent, the highest in 21 years.

Despite public whining about “election fatigue” and surveys suggesting that the political deadlock would not be broken, citizens came out in record numbers to cast their ballots. Contrary to descriptions of countrywide malaise, the atmosphere at polling stations was cheerful and energetic. Social media was rife with smiling selfies of voters doing their civic duty, as well as photos of children accompanying their parents in the process.

Even most of the 5,500 Israelis subjected to house quarantine—as a result of possibly being exposed to the coronavirus—showed up at the 16 special tents set up for them across the country. Though they complained of long lines, they appeared to be happy to be out in the world after spending several days stuck in isolation, with only Netflix to keep them company.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/israels-conservative-consensus-11583281438?mod=opinion_lead_pos4

A nationalist leader runs against liberal elites and a rigged system. He’s opposed by most of the security establishment, called a threat to democracy, and bombarded with legal investigations and prosecutions. Yet the efforts to use the legal system to oust him fail and even cause his support with voters to tick upward.

That could apply to President Trump, but it also reflects the political saga of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who on Monday outperformed expectations at the ballot box even as his corruption trial looms. Sixty-one seats in the Knesset are required for a majority government, and Mr. Netanyahu’s center-right coalition is expected to secure 58 to the opposition’s 55 in the latest Haaretz tally.

That’s a notable improvement on the 55 seats Mr. Netanyahu’s coalition won last time, but it may not be enough to break the political stalemate that has led to three Israeli elections in a year. If the numbers hold, the Prime Minister still must coax at least three parliamentarians from opposing parties to his side.

Mr. Netanyahu’s comfortable majority fell apart last May when a secular nationalist party headed by Avigdor Lieberman broke with Mr. Netanyahu over his accommodation of military exemptions for Haredi Jews. The second election in September saw Mr. Netanyahu’s bloc shrink, but the opposing Blue and White coalition also couldn’t form a government.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/15671/palestinians-voting

The absence of parliamentary life for the Palestinians has, in fact, been highly convenient for Abbas, who continues to demonstrate zero tolerance towards his political rivals and critics.

While Palestinian members of parliament have been deprived of salaries and stripped of parliamentary immunity, as well as denied freedom of expression and the opportunity to exercise their parliamentary work, Arab members of the Knesset in Israel are free to say whatever they wish about the Israeli government and its policies without giving a single thought to possible repercussions.

For now, Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip will have to continue accepting the reality of living under the unelected and totalitarian leaders of the PA and Hamas. For the Palestinians, each Israeli election serves as a sad reminder of the catastrophic failure of Palestinian leaders and the complete absence of democracy under the PA and Hamas.

The international community, meanwhile, continues to ignore that the Palestinians are being denied the chance to hold elections. Denouncing Israel can be a full-time job, one that leaves little room for remembering that, for 14 years, Palestinians have been deprived of their right to touch a ballot.

Yesterday, March 2, Israeli voters headed to the ballot boxes for the tenth time since the signing of the Oslo Accords with the Palestinians in 1993. The Palestinians, by contrast, have since had only four elections — two for the Palestinian Authority (PA) presidency and two for the Palestinian parliament, the Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC).

The last Palestinian election took place in 2006, when Palestinians voted for the PLC. Hamas, the Islamist movement ruling the Gaza Strip, won 44.4% of the vote (74 seats), while PA President Mahmoud Abbas’s rival Fatah faction won 41.4% of the vote (45 seats). The PLC has 132 seats.

https://www.nysun.com/editorials/beyond-netanyahus-on-the-brink-of-triumph/91034/

The way The New York Sun looks at what appears to be a dramatic victory by Prime Minister Netanyahu in today’s election is as part of a broader story. It involves not only Israel but all of the freedom countries. It echoes Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s triumph in the campaign for Brexit. The dynamic at work in the two elections may turn out to presage a victory by President Trump in the election that is gathering in America.

Results in Israel’s vote — it’s third in the past year, after two earlier contests failed to produce a government — appear, finally, to have put Mr. Netanyahu within reach of a mandate. It’s all the more astonishing because it comes as the incumbent premier is about to stand trial on criminal charges of bribery. Yet early returns show that Mr. Netanyahu’s Likud Party appears to be within a seat or three of a majority in the Knesset.

If confirmed, that would put Mr. Netanyahu in the pole position to seek to put together a government by trying to win over from other parties one or more Knesset members. He could even seek coalition partners from the main opposition bloc, known as Blue and White. The betting is that Mr. Netanyahu will be able to do that. No newspapermen are predicting otherwise, though final results are due only Wednesday.

https://www.jpost.com/Israel-Elections/Benjamin-Netanyahus-Right-bloc-wins-majority-exit-polls-619513

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu succeeded in winning 60 seats for his bloc of right-wing and religious parties in Monday’s election, one less than he needed for a majority in the Knesset, according to exit polls on the three television networks.

The exit polls indicated that Netanyahu’s Likud won 36-37 seats. Its allies in Shas, UTJ and Yamina won 9, 7-8 and 6-7 respectively. The polls gave Blue and White 33 seats, its ally Labor-Gesher-Meretz 6-7, the Joint List 14-15 and Yisrael Beytenu 6-8.The numbers are expected to change overnight. The votes of IDF soldiers, who tend to lean to the Right, have not yet been counted and the Joint List tends to go down a seat when the soldiers’ votes are added. But if the Right does not obtain its 61st seat, it could end up being because the far Right Otzma Yehudit party refused Netanyahu’s repeated requests to quit the race.