Please tell me about Israeli party politics WRT the Palestinians and the settlements

Great Debates
1

Perhaps this should go in GQ, but, given the nature of the topic, it would probably be moved to GD before too long, so here goes . . .

In Israeli politics, the elephant in the living room is always the Palestinian question: What to do, ultimately, with the Occupied Territories and the Israeli settlements in them? Everyone knows that, but I’m a little unclear on where the various political parties in Israel stand on this question.

Does any party stand for complete military withdrawal, dismantling the settlements, and total independence for the Palestinians?

Does any (electorally significant) party stand for driving out all the Palestinians and thoroughly colonizing the Territories with Israelis?

Does any party stand for a “one-state solution,” annexing the territories outright and extending full Israeli citizenship and voting rights to the Palestinians?

And how much support does each of these positions appear to have among the general public?

At least there’s no question where Sharon stands. From In These Times, 7/11/05, http://www.inthesetimes.com/site/main/article/2173/:

Is this the solution most Israelis favor? Or is it a minority viewpoint?

And – when’s the next election? And is there any chance it will be an occasion for the people to choose between very different approaches to the problem?

2

Nobody knows?

3

God, I only hope I’m in time! Don’t go there, BG! Don’t do it! Great minds, roughly comparable to our own, have foundered on the shoals of Israeli politics, ending up munching Thorazine and staring at the aquarium for days at a time.

Unless you actually live in Israel, and therefore have no choice but to try and comprehend Israeli politics, run away. Flee, at once. Compared to Israeli politics, the Texas Legislature is an Amish PTA meeting. I had a friend who shattered his reason trying to understand the parliamentary alliance between the Kabbalistic Vegetarian Party and the Reform Atheists.

OK, so maybe that’s a good thing. But is it worth the risk?

4

Taken under advisement [tugs at collar and sweats] but I’m going with a narrow focus here, trying to understand not Israeli politics in general (e.g., tax policy, social services, relationship of religious to civil law, Ashkenazi-Sephardi ethnic tensions), but only the specific range of issues around the ultimate disposition of the Territories and the Palestinians. Which should be a safer enterprise . . . in the sense that parachuting behind enemy lines during the Battle of the Bulge would be safer than loading your pockets with live grenades and stuffing yourself into a wood-chipper . . .

[monty python]

For safety’s sake, each of the men assigned with translating the Killer Joke into German was allowed to see one word only. One man saw two words, and spent several weeks in hospital.

[/mp]

5

It’s important to understand that the “specific range of issues” you’ve asked about are actually a huge, amorphous mass of controversy, and that there is a lot of intra-party disagreement about how to deal with them.

There is one party that I mention with trepidation, because I think it gives the wrong idea about Israel and its citizens’ views, but:

There is a party that stands for this, and it’s called “Kach,” which literally means “take.” However, I believe the name is actually a condensing of the words “Kahane Chai,” meaning “Kahane lives.” This refers to Rabbi Meir Kahane, who advocated this plan.

However, this party is not electorally significant. It has no seats in the Knesset, and when it makes any sort of statement, it’s roundly denounced by almost the entire Israeli public.

6

Also, the article you read regarding Sharon’s views is a bit misleading.

First of all, it should be noted that evacuating Jewish residents of Gaza is already seen as a betrayal by the vast majority of Sharon’s Likud party. There are 40 Likud members of Knesset, and 30 of them oppose this evacuation. The Gaza withdrawal is not nearly as universally well-regarded in Israel as it is in America or Europe. It has a slim majority behind it, but not a consensus by any means. Therefore, to spearhead that pullout is already a major concession on Sharon’s part.

Second, it’s impossible to “anex a large portion” of any “state-to-be.” The settlement blocs being discussed are not governed by the Palestinian Authority, but by Israel. It’s a major assumption that these would even be part of the Palestinian state and then need to be annexed to be under Israeli control. Sharon is merely saying that he’ll retain control of areas that are already Israel, not that he’ll seize any Palestinian areas.

Third, it is irrelevant that the “Palestinian State-to-be” is just “22 percent of the British Mandate of Palestine.” The national borders to be decided will reflect where people live, not a cartographer’s abstract idea idea of statehood. The green line was never meant to be a border. It was an armistice line. It reflected a military reality. It was where everyone agreed to stop shooting. Then there was more shooting. The fact that armistice lines are still thought of as relevant after the armistice has been violated repeatedly is ridiculous. The military reality has changed.
If the Palestinians wanted to split Mandatory Palestine 50/50, they could have accepted the UN Partition Plan in 1947 the way Israel did. Instead, they started a war to fight for all of the territory Britain had just vacated, and the Palestinian National Charter still reflects this determination to sieze all of the territory controlled by Britain from 1917-1947. So the equitable division of land was shot to hell when the Palestinians rejected it. Then, there were wars, and some time over the last 57 years, people bought houses and planted trees and nailed up birdhouses, Israelis and Palestinians alike. Therefore, the new national boundaries will, where possible, reflect those years’ settlement patterns, regardless of the tally of percentage points. The reality on the ground is more important than the UN’s 1947 castle in the air.

Fourth, in the area of the article that you snipped, it says that East Jerusalem is one of the “most central aspects of the occupation.”
It should be noted that East Jerusalem is not occupied by any reasonable definition. Immediately after taking control of the area in 1967, Israel annexed East Jerusalem and gave all its Arab residents citizenship. They became the largest group of Israeli Arabs in the nation. They are equal to Jerusalem’s Jews in almost every way, except, of course, that Israel does not require them to serve in the military. East Jerusalem is not occupied Palestinian territory, but simply part of Israel.

I know that none of this is in direct response to your questions. I’m just trying to convey that the issues are significantly more nuanced than In these Times seems to think, and that you should take note when your souce refers to Israel as “Machiavellian,” as this article does. This should also serve to explain a little why “ending the occupation” is not nearly as simple as it sometimes seems, and why these few issues would engender such division within Israeli government and society.

7

:confused: Correct me if I’m wrong, but Israel has never formally annexed any part of the Occupied Territories, other than East Jerusalem. The Israeli settlers, exactly like the Palestinians themselves, live on territory that is “governed” by Israel but is not part of the sovereign territory of any state (Jordan having disclaimed it, Israel not having annexed it, and no Palestinian state yet existing).

8

Forgive me if this is a stupid question (sometimes my humor detector is a bit faulty), but is there really a Kabbalistic Vegetarian Party?

9

Not to the best of my knowledge.

The main Israeli parties are Likud and Labour – mostly secular. Then there are the religious parties (UTJ is the big Ashkenazi party and Shas the big Sephardi party). The next biggest parties are probably Shinui (a center-right party that is devoted to secularism), the Arab parties, Yahad, a newer left wing party, and many other smaller parties. I’ll discuss what I know (which may be wrong, I’m an avid follower but by no means an expert or an Israeli) about the parties currently represented in the Knesset.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_political_parties_in_Israel

Likud is strongly divided over the Palestinian issue. Ariel Sharon’s policies are pretty well known by now – pragmatic, reluctant withdrawal from at least Gaza. Much of the party does not support this and remains very pro-settler. The language that is used most often is about the lack of a Palestinian partner for peace negotiations – i.e. nobody in the Palestinian leadership is strong enough to disarm and keep a cease-fire, so there is no use in negotiating. This is somewhat of a delaying tactic and I don’t think that there are many members of Likud supporting outright transfer or outright withdrawal – their policy remains pretty murky. As does Sharon, beyond Gaza withdrawal, to which he seems very committed.

Labour is the left wing party. It too is somewhat in disarray. Mostly, Labour supports negotiations but they too have set no firm withdrawal plan. The most commonly held view, IMHO, is withdrawal to the separation fence with dismantling settlements beyond it and annexation of everything else. This is not entirely popular outside of Israel, obviously.

Once you step away from the major parties, which try to build reasonable consensus, you get to smaller parties which can take more niche views. Since Israel is a parliamentary system, you only vote by party, and since coalition building is necessary for forming a government, you don’t feel like you are wasting a vote this way. So Shas represents the needs of the Sephardim and goes after money for their schools, etc, but often forms coalitions with either Labour or Likud. Parties like Shas, who are not directly focused on the Israeli/Palestinian conflict, have shifted their views on a final settlement based on whose government they are in.

Other parties, like Yahad (made up of two old left-wing parties IIRC), are directly for withdrawal to pre-1967 borders with a peace treaty and a two-state solution. The aforementioned, banned Kach party is for transfer, as is the National Union coalition (includes the old party of Moledet, which means homeland, i.e. a homeland for the Jews and nobody else.)

So to answer your questions directly:

  1. Yes, the Yahad party is for a two-state solution in every sense of the word.
  2. Yes, the Moledet party, now part of the National Union, was specifically founded for transfer of the Palestinians out of the territories.
  3. Probably the Israeli Arab parties (which get full representation in the Knesset) are for full citizenship for all Palestinians but to my knowledge no non-Arab party would advocate that as it would be immensely unpopular among the Jewish population of Israel, who would soon be a minority. A little research shows that indeed, Balad, an Arab party does advocate exactly this.

I can’t give a zeitgeist of the average Israeli, but I think the answer would be that there is no average Israeli. Israel is very polarized right now: Arab versus Jew, secular versus religious, left versus right. Each has a party. I would say that among secular Israelis, even ones that used to consider themselves very Zionist (like much of Likud), the settlements and especially the Gaza settlements and the new West Bank settlements, are increasingly seen as security liabilities. IMHO, most Israelis would like the ability to lock down the country behind a security fence and let the Palestinians stew. If a country emerges, great. If they want to be friends, even better.

Religious and right-leaning Israelis (maybe like Zehava) still believe in the right of settlement, and they have many justifications, some of them which actually are pretty good, which they will gladly argue with you. These include God’s word, but also things like Arab underusage of the land, to the victors go the spoils, etc. I’m sure others can do a more capable job than I can in explaining these.

Whew. I hope I haven’t butchered things too badly.

10

BrianGlutton, don’t go away! I’m at work right now, so I can’t even start on an answer, but I’ll write up something when I get home this evening. It’s noon here now, so expect to see something from me within the next 12 hours.

Just one or two important points, to illuminate previous posts, for now:

  1. Kach come from the word “Thus” (as in “this is the way to do it!”), not “take” – it’s Kaph,kaph, not Qoph,kaph.
  2. It is not only marginalized but actually outlawed in Israel – not specifically, but the law outlawing “racist” political parties was tailor-made for them.
  3. Yahad is just the newest re-incarnation of Meretz, joined by (or more likely taken over by) Yossi Beilin

Enough for now – gotta work. Get back to this later!

Dani

11

… “not Qoph,Khet”, of course :smack:

And appologies for mangling your handle, as well, BrainGlutton

Like I said, more later.

12

OK - here’s a brief run-down on the various stances re: Palestinian State in the different Israeli political parties:

No time right now to address any of the other questions in the OP – please let me know if there’s anything else you see as really important and I’ll try to get to it tomorrow.

========================================================

Arabs – about 10 Members of Knesset (MK’s). Ideologically pro-Palestinian, rather than pro-Israeli. Ovbiously in favor of a Palestinian state on all of the Occupied Territories. In some cases, unofficially at least in favor of a one-state solution (which they see as leading within a few generations to an Arab country)

Yahad (Meretz) – 6 MKs. Ideologically in favor of a Palestinian state in all of the O.T., perhaps except for the Old City of Jerusalem. Definitely against any one-state solution.
They believe that this is the only way to retain an ethnicly Jewish and politically Democratic country.

Labor – 22 MKs. Pragmaticly resigned to a Palestinian state in most or nearly all the O.T. Not all are happy with the idea – but they too, see this as the only solution retaining an Israel that is both somehow “Jewish” and Democratic.

Shinui – 15 MKs. couldn’t care less. It isn’t on their radar. They care a lot more about Separation of Synagouge and State. On the whole are for the Disengagement (and a future Palestinian state) mostly in order to hork off the Reliious Right.

Likud - around 40 MKs. There is no single Likud. Sharon’s faction (15-20 MKs) hates the idea, but realizes that a Palestinian state is probably inevitable. Right now they are trying to keep it as small as possible (thus, the Disengagement, (almost) from Gaza only, meant to squelch world opinion demanding a full Palestinian state, at least for now).
Netanyahu’s faction, OTOH… see “Ultra-right” below.

Ultra-right – about 25 MKs. both religious and secular (but mostly isomorphic to the religious population and parties). Single (Jewish) state solution. Any arabs who were not given citizenship when we made the mistake of keeping their parents here after 1948 :rolleyes: should not be given Israeli citizenship. They’s love it if they left the country and went to Joran and Egypt (althoght they stop short of officially putting it on their agenda. They wink a lot). The right wing of Likud (Netanyahu’s faction, about 20-25 MKs) probably fit here, too.

OK, the above is a very short and incomplete analysis, but gives at least a starting look at things.

Hope this helps (or is even comprehensible to someone not living in this quagmire :eek: )

Dani

13

Thanks, Noone! Further questions:

  1. When is the next election to the Knessit?

  2. Is there any chance the election would return results giving the Arabs, Yahad, Labor and Shinui (all pro-two-state-solution parties, more or less) a collective majority?

  3. In such event, would that significantly improve the possibility of a viable two-state solution being implemented?

  4. Could (3) come about without the settlements being evacuated?

  5. Could (3) come about without all of the West Bank east of the Green Line being deeded over to Palestine?

14

Scheduled, I believe, for November 2006 (or is it 2007?) It doesn’t really matter – the Knesset will almost certainly disband itself and we will have new elections within a year of the Disengagement in August – probably sooner.

No. At a very optimistic (for them) extreme, all these parties together might get around 55 MKs.

Like I said, it ain’t happenning…

Neither of these are relevant as being led by labor. It just doesn’t have the clout nor the legitimacy. But if the disengagement doesn’t backfire badly – say Gaza becomes nearly as quiet vis-a-vis Israel as Lebanon is now – then Likud (if Sharon can ride the coattails of his success properly) just might lead this. And yes, in that case more settlements would be evacuated in those parts of the OT that would be deeded over. ALL of the OT? I don’t see a concensus on the Old City of Jeruslaem, Ma’ale Adumim, Gush Etzion or Ariel (in descending order of difficulty – Ariel could probably be handed over eventually if the promised tit-for-tat was, eg, full recognition of Israel)

But in the end, it’s a question of bargaining. And neither side is about to lay either their cards or all their chips on the table at this early date…

Dani

15

Update: Benjamin Netanyahu has resigned from the Likud government in protest over the Gaza pullout, and he will probably challenge Sharon for the party leadership. http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/610570.html So, how does that affect the partisan-strength calculations WRT to the Territories/Palestinians?

16

I’m not sure we’re even asking the right question anymore. The mutterings in the background about a “Big Bang” in Israeli politics – Sharon, Peres and Lapid joining forces for a true, power-house centrist party – are becoming more and more verbalized as Netanyahu appears to consolidate his hold on Likud.

According to a recent poll, this Sharon/Lapid/Peres party could garner over 30% of the popular vote (38-40 seats in Knesset), while “traditional” Likud and Labor would be reduced to around 14 and 7 seats, respectively. In this scenario, “traditional” Shinui, if it even runs, is wiped out.
I assume (although the poll didn’t have any data) that both Yahad on the left and National Union on the right would grow stronger under this kind of scenario.

My WAG is that you’d end up with: Arabs - 10; Yahad - 6-8; (old) Labor - 6-8; Center 40. Enough to effect the swing of power from right to left, but only with the Arabs as a formal part of coalition. I’m not sure Sharon and his voters are quite ready for that yet; so they might try to bring in (old) Likud instead, which would most likely prodice a stalemate post-haste.

Nobody is quite sure when the elections will be, anyway. The best I’m willing to guess is “sometime during 2006.”

I’ll hunt down cites later (I’m at work now)

Dani

17

The promised Cite re: “Big Bang” and poll results

Highlights:

If the “Big Bang” center party does emerge:New Center party (Sharon/Peres/Lapid): 38 seats [out of 120]
Likud: 14
Labor: 7

If Sharon stays in Likud and tries to win re-nomination:Netanyahu: 35%
Sharon: 29%
Landau: 17%

18

Hey Noone, that was really informative, thanks!

One thing I’ve never understood about parliamentary governments in general is why the PM will call for early elections when they’re not positive they’ll be reelected. I was in Israel when Netanyahu called for early elections, and he ended up losing to Ehud Barak. (Incidentally, Israeli elections are about a million times more exciting than American elections. They crazy, man.) I’m sure there’s some strategic reason for doing it, but I’m unclear on what that is.

19

A major reason is that they no longer have enough support to control the major issue votes in parliament. In a parliamentary democracy this is almost always an automatic call for an election (although, depending on the details of the political process, the opposition may be given an opportunity to form a new government if they can gain enough support). A PM may call a pre-emptive election if he suspects such a non-confidence vote may be in the offing, in hopes of gaining an advantage from not having been formally kicked in the teeth, or at least not loosing as badly as he otherwise might have.

There’s also timing issues. In Canada, the maximum time between elections is 5 years, but a government which hangs on much beyond 4 years is generally seen as increasingly desperate and unwilling to face the electorate. Again the issue may be trying to make the best of it so as to avoid losing too badly rather than hoping for a win.

And there’s simple miscalculation as well. The Canadian Conservative party went into an election in 1993 with 169 MPs, a significant majority, fresh from dumping an unpopular leader, and good confidence in winning a new term. They came out of it with 2 MPs and a party that eventually dissolved itself and was annexed by the new Reform/Alliance party.

20

Well, Bookkeeper gave a pretty good breakdown of how Parliamentary Democracy, in general, works. In Israel, usually it’s the “step down without getting kicked in the teeth” reason – the past few Knessets have been disolved when the Coalition essentially fell apart, leading to cases where an extremist faction within the colaition would be willing to vote “No Confidence” in Government along with the formal opposition. This happens when said extremist faction thinks (often correctly) that such a move will play well to their own voter base (because G’vmt is behaving too rationally for them :rolleyes: )

This kind of end-run around the Prime Minister and his own bloc generally ends in an agreement between the PM and the chief Opposition party on a new elections – preferable to both than the tail (the extreme faction on either left or right) wagging the parliamentary dog for its own benefit, thus pulling votes away from the mainstream.

… And, of course, sometimes the reason for a PM calling new elections could be summed up, if he were to be asked five years later and answered honestly, in the phrase “it seemed like a good idea at the time…” :stuck_out_tongue:

Dani