It’s going to take me a couple of days to get back up to speed on the very confusing nature of elections to the Israeli Knesset. However, any chance to get rid of Benjamin Netanyahu is a good thing.
Netanyahu to be indicted! Anything that gets rid of Netanyahu is a good thing, one of the most dangerous and despicable world leaders.
Benjamin Netanyahu: Israel PM faces corruption charges Benjamin Netanyahu: Israel PM faces corruption charges - BBC News
It’s been a while coming. I haven’t talked to an Israeli who actually liked the guy in about 10 years… But say what you will about him, he’s a brilliant politician who knows exactly how to navigate the parliamentary system. Hopefully the charges stick and he will finally be gone for good!
He’s won the election and can now cobble together legislation to give himself immunity. I’m afraid you’ll have to but up with Netanyahu for a long time yet.
As Dumb Donnie says, American Jews will keep their same prime minister. If AOC had said this there would have been mass hysteria on Fox.
Looks like the pre-election pollsters pulled a Trump 2016. They predicted Gantz would win by a significant margin. Nothing of the sort happened; Netanyahu won yet again.
From everything I’ve seen, Nutty-yahoo “won” the same way Trump “won”…a combination of dirty tricks and over-the-top racism.
Not every election the Left loses is illegitimate. What “dirty tricks” are you referring to?
By exploiting and inflaming polarization among Israelis rather than trying to promote unity (and peace).
So, maybe not dirty tricks as you see them, but dirty, and tricky in the worst sense of the word.
ETA: Summarized in this post.
Benny Gantz is “The Left”? I mean, he was only the head of the Israeli Defense Forces a few years ago…
He allied with a left-wing party for the purpose of politics. He might not himself be left-leaning, but the party that he was acting figurehead of was left.
Good NYT article comparing Netanyahu’s victory with how Trump might conceivably pull off an improbable 2020 reelection win.
In total sincerity, thanks for your response. 
Good NYT article comparing Netanyahu’s victory with how Trump [DEL]might conceivably[/DEL] will pull off an improbable 2020 reelection win.
Fixed that for you.
If the 20th Century was the century of democracy, then the 21st is the century in which authoritarianism is making a comeback. It’s less based on ideology and more dressed up as ethnic nationalism, but as with authoritarianism in any form, it’s an attempt to distract people from the corruption and naked theft from taxpaying people who fund government and expect public services and a stable economy in return.
What people like Bibi and Trump fear is that there will be a broad coalition that calls them out and beats them at the ballot box. To some degree, it is accepted that they need some corrupted form of democracy to lend legitimacy to their regime. Democracy, though, poses a danger. Unity is their enemy. Inclusion is their enemy. They need people to recognize the differences among them, rather than their shared economic interests. And what has been proven to work in democracies past is dividing people along tribal lines because it’s the most obvious difference. Wherever there is a history of ethnic tension and competition between ethnic groups, polarization can succeed and be used to divide and conquer.
That is why Netanyahu ran such a demonstrably racist campaign, and that is why Trump will run a campaign that is no less nasty. They are betting that just enough voters will need someone to feel superior to.
??? Gantz FOUNDED his own political party, the Israel Resilience Party , less than a year ago. Granted, Israel Resilience did form the Blue And White slate by merging with Yesh Atid, another relatively new party founded by Yair Lapin, who is such a radical leftie that he was Minister of Finance under Netanyahu a few years ago.
I never said Lapid was a “radical” leftie, but his party is certainly to the left of Likud, and his party’s triumph was definitely the electoral result that the left favored in this election (well, of the realistic results. I’m sure true left wingers would have loved for Labour and Meretz to win big). As for Gantz’s involvement, I’ll happily accept the correction on the historical point…it doesn’t really change what I said about his party (in this election) being the “left” party despite the fact that he himself might not be left wing.
I’m not super familiar with them, but Blue and White seem like Eisenhower-style conservatives - their Palestinian policy is based on setting preconditions for negotiation, and otherwise essentially pursuing containment. Otherwise they seem pragmatic/moderate.
Oops, I did it again as Israel will be calling new elections since Netanyahu can’t form a coalition. Can we hope for better results this time?
I have to admit, as much as I love politics, Israeli politics and all these minor parties make it very difficult to follow.
Holy shit. Lieberman pulled the trigger. I never thought he’d do it.
Let’s get something straight: Avigdor Lieberman is a right-wing thug and a bully, and probably every bit as corrupt as Netanyahu. But he’s also a Russian, and if there’s two things you can say abut the massive Russian immigrant community, is that it is staunchly right-wing, and even more staunchly secular. Lieberman looked at his base, looked at the encroaching power of the Ultra-Orthdox politicians, and said: Nope.
Plus of course, like everyone who’s ever worked with Bibi, he hates the man’s guts. The chickens, they have come home to roost.
So we’re having a do-over election. I don’t think we’ll see a huge difference in results - the historical and demographic processes that pushed a decisive majority of the Israeli public to the right won’t disappear overnight, if at all. But we’ll see *some *change, I think. After all, Bibi lost, bigly, and Israelis hate a loser. Maybe next election day - September 17! - enough Likud voters will think, “He couldn’t build a coalition last time, maybe he won’t be able next time too”, and either stay home or vote for someone else, and then we’ll have a different result.
One can only dream.