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Eat your vegetables (while you can)

We’ve got so many problems on our plates right now in Israel – the Iranian threat, Hamas, Hizbullah, the debate about settlements and illegal outposts. But it’s encouraging to note that not every issue is a life or death existential conundrum.

Sometimes it also comes down to fruits and vegetables. Hundreds of vendors and growers are expected to converge on the Knesset this week as the Knesset Finance Committee prepares to discuss the country’s draft budget for 2009, which includes imposing a 16.5% value added tax on fruits and veggies. Currently there is no VAT on those items, and those food staples are still affordable among all segments of society.

“The increase will cause problems throughout all of the economy, from restaurants to falafel stands to canned goods, and will ultimately lead to inflation,” warned Likud MK Miri Regev, who was planning to do a walkabout in her local vegetable shuk in Kiryat Gat to protest the tax.

A family spending 500 shekels ($125) a month on fruits and vegetables would find their bill increased by over 82 shekels – no small amount when you’re living on a budget.

“In a period of recession, we expect that people should have more money to invest into the economy, and this proposition would do exactly the opposite. The increased VAT will become an engine that will stop the economy,” Regev told the Jerusalem Post.

“We have absorbed a lot of difficulties and decrees,” said Meir Yifrach of the Vegetable Growers Association, “but this time we won’t sit quietly.”

Regev met with Finance Committee Chairman MK Moshe Gafni (UTJ) and secured invitations for produce-sellers, including supermarket owner Rami Levi and owners of market stalls, to come and testify before the committee on the impact of the proposed tax.

According to the Post, Regev also plans on meeting with Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu to try to convince him to remove the clause from the budget before it is voted on by the Knesset in the coming weeks.

“I am sure that the prime minister, who showed responsibility by canceling the social-welfare cuts that the Finance Ministry’s accountants had included in the budget, will do the same for this,” said Regev.

Fruits and veggies in season have always been a staple at our house, and it would be shame to find them suddenly turned into ‘premium’ items overnight.

May the new Israeli government live to a ripe old age

Well, it’s April 1st – and we have a new government in Israel. I’m assuming there’s no connection between those two facts, and like all Israelis, I wish Prime Minister Netanyahu and his 30 ministers the wisdom and foresight to see us through these tough times.

Watching the swearing in ceremony at the Knesset late last night, we were struck by something which typifies the unique hybrid of Israeli culture and norms. Never mind the lack of decorum and acting speaker Ruby Rivlin having to chide MKs to keep quiet while the members of the 32nd government were giving their oaths. We’re used to that.

But here were all these powerful government ministers getting up on the podium, one by one, before the Knesset, the nation, and the world. And they were beginning their oaths by saying, “I, Gideon Saar, the son of Ezra, blessed be his memory, and Rivka, may she live to a ripe old age…”

In what other country would you hear that? Call it heimish, quaint, or just a subtle affirmation that, hey… you just can’t take the Jewish out of Israel.

It’s unlikely that Sa’ar, or any of the other secular-looking ministers are religiously observant, but Judaism is such an integral part of Israeli culture, that it sounded perfectly natural to hear the ministers add on the religious embellishments to their parents’ names.

It’s a trivial matter, and for most viewers, it was probably second nature to hear. But for some people who moved to Israel out of choice – whether observant or secular – it was just one more instance of realizing that they had made a good decision.

Working for the weekend

As we all know, everybody’s working for the weekend. And here in Israel, “the weekend” is a fluid concept. Most of us work on Sundays through Thursdays, with the weekend consisting of Friday and Saturday (the Jewish day of rest). Many offices and places of business are, however, open on Fridays, for at least a half day, which means that for many in the country, the weekend consists of one day. Many immigrants to Israel never fully get used to the schedule.

In the past, there have been efforts to change things, instituting a four- or five-day work week based on Sundays off, which would at least have the benefit of allowing Saturday nights to not be “school nights.” Debate in the Knesset has raged on the issue, with many arguing that Fridays make for the better standardized day off. Much of the opposition to shortening or otherwise tinkering with the work has been based on religious grounds, but trade groups and big business bodies have also expressed concern over the specter of diminished productivity.

But with the global economic crisis starting to be strongly felt in these parts, now it’s the businesses that are aiming to make their unavoidably lower output levels more affordable by lowering manpower costs. As a result, Haaretz reports, four-day work weeks, and corresponding cuts in worker benefits, are already being unilaterally imposed by many Israeli employers:

Hundreds of employees will have to get used to this new reality at Sapiens, Numonyx and Keter, as well as some hotels and other enterprises. The rationale is obvious: saving 20% of wage costs and operating costs on days when the firm is shut down. For workers, it means a 20% salary cut, and the “disappearance” of vacation days due to them by law, replaced by forced vacation days.

According to a lawyer interviewed by Haaretz, unless the employees complain, the companies are completely legitimate in their unilateral slashing of benefits, which extend beyond vacation days and include lowering deposits into schemes for pensions and stipends of various types. And are the workers complaining? In a climate where many feel fortunate to have jobs at all, not so much.

“In normal conditions I would have been angry,” [Rechovot-based Applied Materials engineer] Ami says, “but we recognize the reality. Just two months ago the company laid off 10% of its workforce, and luckily I survived that wave.”

Apparently, firms in the US have been taking similar measures since the economic fallout first took place in the fall, and the British government is considering going to a three-day week. Of course, over there, Sundays were days of rest to begin with.

Image of the view from a high-rise in Rechovot courtesy hofnik from Flickr under a Creative Commons license.

New Knesset elected, coalition talks underway

The results are in. The election is finally over. Even though the Bibi Netanyahu-led Likud party was well ahead in the polls a few weeks ago, Tzipi Livni’s Kadima garnered one more seat than Likud in a stunning photo finish, explained by Haaretz thusly:

Livni forced Netanyahu to treat her as an equal, despite his negative ads claiming the job is “too big for her.” From that point, he lost the advantage of experience. Livni proved to be an expert campaigner who saved enough energy for the final and decisive round.

Several fascinating statistical and graphical breakdowns of the results can be seen here, while a breakdown of the number of seats per party, along with plenty of analysis and victory speech soundbytes, can be seen here.

Perhaps because the left has splintered into several newer and smaller parties, many of which did not garner enough votes for even one Knesset seat, the mainstream left-wing Labor, led by Ehud Barak, will only hold 14 seats, leaving its leadership disillusioned and vowing to sit out of coalition talks.

Avigdor Lieberman’s hardcore right-wing Israel Beiteinu managed to crystallize Israel’s right-of-center undecided, which, in essence, ended up detracting from Likud’s support among hard-liners, which, in turn, gave the relatively centrist (but Ariel Sharon-founded) Kadima a proportionate edge (causing the world to wonder where this leaves us in terms of options for diplomacy with the Palestinians).

However, it’s Israel Beiteinu that’s going to make or break any coalition which Livni has already hit the ground running trying to form, so Lieberman’s agenda hasn’t backfired completely. Let’s not forget that this is Livni’s second chance to try and form a coalition, with the first time around, this past fall, not yielding any results at all.

So yes, it does seem that public opinion here has moved towards the right, and it’s parties which sit decidedly on the right which have the power to make or break a government. But at the same time, the Likud’s failure to seal the deal says quite a bit about the strength of the middle ground (whatever that may or may not mean).

Image courtesy tzipilivni2009 from Flickr under a Creative Commons license.

A very Druze Knesset

The Israeli Druze are a mysterious and interesting people. They are known to eat raw meatballs. They find their spouses on the internet (okay, we do that too). Although it can be argued that they know no borders, they are historically extremely loyal to Israel, fighting as part of our military since the War of Independence and even teaching in our universities.

About a year ago, some alarming news reached the public when Israel’s National Resilience Survey results claimed that Israeli patriotism among the Druze was dropping rapidly. Balad party Member of Knesset Said Naffaa had harsh words to say to YNet on the matter at the time:

“Israel had always viewed the Druze as some type of domesticated beast, but now this previously docile animal is fighting back,” said Naffaa.

Moreover, Israel has taken quite a bit of heat recently when the government decided last month to ban two Arab parties from the upcoming election (Yes, Balad is one of them), given their track records for anti-Israel sentiment, rhetoric and actions.

With polls opening in a number of hours and election fever in full swing, one aspect to the situation that has unfortunately not been emphasized is the potential for this upcoming Knesset to be the most disproportionately Druze-represented than any ever before. How’s that for tolerance and diversity? Even extremist Yisrael Beitenu party has a Druze on their candidate list.

Haaretz did the math for us recently, revealing that a total of five Druze candidates were likely to garner seats:

According to the government’s statistical yearbook for 2008, Israel has about 120,000 Druze citizens, constituting 1.6 percent of the population. Five Druze lawmakers would be 4 percent of the Knesset’s 120 members, 2.5 times more than the proportion of the community within the national population.

And the best part is, the candidates hardly seem interested in only representing their small ethnicity:

Deputy Foreign Minister Majali Wahabi (Kadima), a Druze, said yesterday that his community cannot be expected to vote en bloc: “The large parties have to understand the importance of our community. I personally plan to represent my people faithfully, but also anyone who voted for my party, no matter what sector they come from. I believe in our involvement in Israeli society, not in separate parties.”

Tomorrow, Israel has much to decide and crystallize. At least there’s a good chance that our legislative body will be far more diverse and far less “special interest”-focused than we’re led to believe.

Image of a Druze man in the Golan courtesy tierecke from Flickr under a Creative Commons license.

Deviating from the election norm

Elections are just a couple days away and the nation seems, well, uninspired. It’s quite frustrating actually. It seems like everyone I talk to is annoyed and sick and tired of the same old faces and the same old parties. I don’t think I’ve heard anyone speak enthusiastically this election or about the party they support. The prevalent attitude I’ve been hearing is that nothing is going to change so I’m just going to vote for [name party affiliation here]. Some might argue that the problem is with the system (true) and that it does not allow for any real representation or accountability (double true). So where does this leave us? Depressed? Slightly. Disappointed? Absolutely. I’m still not sure what to do. I fall fairly flat in the center – so naturally Kadima should be an option for me, right? Wrong. I won’t vote for a party with the ilk of Tzachi Hanegbi in a leadership position. He was indicted a couple of years ago for political appointments while serving as minister of the environment between 2001 and 2003 and has pretty much acted like a thug his entire life.

Kadima Shadima I say. Everyone I know is voting for Kadima because “they don’t really have a choice.” Thing is, there is a choice. And for me that choice is integrity. Kadima is in essence a national unity government running on the same ticket. They may have filled their initially filled their ranks with star academics and new faces (where are they now?) but the fact remains that sleazy politicians like Hanegbi and Ronnie Bar-On are still in the top spots. That’s not anything I can believe in.

Bottom line is that Kadima is just more of the same – self-interested politicians who represent nobody but themselves.

Everyone always promises reform but no one delivers. Since 1991, Knesset members have voted to raise their salaries by 90%. And two years ago NIS 10 million was allocated to the expense accounts of Parliamentary aides. An increase of NIS 10,000 a month per aide, that’s almost double their salaries. Reform…right.

This is an election about national security and nothing more. That’s what people are voting for and I guess everything else falls to the wayside.

Shas trying a bit of feminism

The Shas party has had the upper hand on Tzipi Livni ever since the Kadima leader’s aspirations to take over from Olmert as prime minister were dashed by Shas’s coalition holdout tactics.

As a result, Livini and Kadima were forced to keep Olmert at the country’s helm, and the general elections scheduled for next week became a necessity. With Kadima trailing in the polls, one can’t resist wondering if Livni has been secretly regretting her decision to not kowtow to Shas back in the fall.

One of the most popular of the second-tier parties, the ultra-Orthodox Sephardi Shas party doesn’t stand a chance to elect a prime minister, but it always finds a way to obtain big cabinet appointments and budgets for its programs as coalition bargaining chips.

But until now, Livni has had one clear advantage over all of the other parties: the feminist card. No other major contending party in this race has a woman at the top of its list, which, as we know, can be a major draw.

And Shas can always use some good PR for believing in the leadership potential for women – especially given that the party’s spiritual figurehead, Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, makes a habit of saying politically incorrect things. Shas has been “trying a bit of feminism” (as our friend Ali G puts it) ever since it launched a “Strengthening Women” platform in December.

This week, the party upped the feminist ante by allowing Rabbi Ovadia Yosef’s daughter-in-law (and flat-mate), Yehudit Yosef, to take on a more public role, Haaretz reports. Apparently, Yehudit Yosef has for years been a major playing behind the scenes with Shas, but this week, she began campaigning on behalf of the party, rallying supporters with an inspiring speech in Jerusalem on Monday:

“I know how concerned [Rabbi Ovadia Yosef] is about women’s issues, how he educated his children to take care of their womenfolk so that they would not lack for anything,” she said. “When he gives his class on Saturday night and comes to the issue of women, he gives them a lecture on how to treat a woman, what to do for her, how to behave, what to buy her, and so forth. It’s such a lovely thing.”

Will lip service like this woo away some potential Kadima voters? We’ll know next week.

Image courtesy tzipilivni2009 from Flickr under a Creative Commons license.

Knesset poster decay

With all the attention on the war against Hamas, one could be forgiven for not remembering that in less than a month, Israel’s going to be electing a new prime minister and Knesset.

Little by little, the campaign posters for the 613 parties running (ok, it’s only ???) are starting to appear on busses and billboards, and the media moguls and spin doctors are gearing up for the always entertaining TV ads which begin airing later this month.

But if you’re waiting for it all to be done and finished, at least one political observer is on your side. Rafi Mann, a veteran journalist for Hebrew paper Ma’ariv, and currently their oped page editor, loves to take photographs of campaign posters – but months and years after they’ve been posted, when they’ve been torn, faded, and petrified by the elements and grafitti artists.

Mann’s been shooting these pieces of ‘art’ for over 12 years, and now, ahead of the February 10th elections, he’s putting on a photography exhibit of some of the best posters – called appropriately ‘Poster Mortem’.

“Sometime after the 1996 elections, I saw some election posters that were still on billboards, pasted one on top of each other, and it was fascinating what happened to them, how they deteriorated and blended together,” Mann told me this week.

“I took some photos, and since then I carry a small camera around and when I’m traveling around the country, whenever I see an interesting old poster still up, I take a picture.”

Poster Mortem promises to be a fascinating look at the political culture in Israel – where Ehud Barak’s face on one poster blends into Bibi Netanyahu’s on the poster beneath it to create a kind of Bela Lugosi hybrid only someone like Tim Burton could think up.

“My sense is that the way the posters look after the elements and time have gotten to them is kind of a metaphor of what happens during elections and the promises that are made,” said Mann.

Let’s hope this year it’s different. But don’t bet on it.

Poster Mortem opens on Thursday evening at Beit Sokolov in Tel Aviv, and will be on display through the elections.

The IDF – a pensioner’s army…

Moshe Peled may be 65-years-old, but that didn’t stop him volunteering for the Israel Defense Force when a call went out a few days ago for reserves. Nor did it bother his 75-year-old partner, Ishai Zimmerman.

Together the two men are driving huge tank transporters across the country, delivering tanks and heavy trucks to wherever the IDF needs them most. Yesterday they were under fire next to Gaza, the rest of the time, Yoni – Peled’s son – isn’t entirely sure.

“They’re like 19-year-olds,” Yoni told me this morning. “They are full of adrenaline.”

Just yesterday Peled called up his seven-year-old grandson, Itamar, and told him: “I’m driving the biggest truck you could ever imagine.” (Tapping into every little boy’s fantasy.) “It’s huge and I’m going to war.”

Israel’s army is known as a people’s army, and for good reason. Once they’ve carried out their three years of service, all the men do reserve duty at least once a year, up to the age of 40, or 43 if you are an officer – and often beyond. In times of trouble, many Israeli men will go out of their way to serve, even flying back from their jobs abroad.

On Monday, Channel 10 reported that when the IDF called up reserves this time around, they had a 115 percent response. In some cases they actually had to send people back home.

Peled, who served as a Member of Knesset for far-right party Tsomet during the 1990s, was the colonel of a tank division. When he left the army, he carried on doing reserve duty. When he reached retirement age a few years ago, he asked the army if he could continue doing miloweem – not as a colonel, however, but as a driver of tank transporters. He told them he wanted to be close to his soldiers.

Since then, every year for a month and a half, Peled and Zimmerman, from neighboring communities in the north of Israel, are called up for duty. Two years ago they served in the Second Lebanon War.

Peled is now getting worried that in a few years the IDF might not let Zimmerman carry on driving these huge tank transporters. So much so in fact that when the IDF Chief of Staff gave a speech to his platoon a couple of months ago, he got up and asked him when he was planning to retire, and whether he’d consider joining him in his tank transporter when he did.

Here we go again

So, it’s all but a foregone conclusion that we’re headed for early elections. Just what this country needs.

Kadima leader Tzippi Livni, claiming that she wasn’t ready to give in to the ‘blackmail’ of potential coalition partners like Shas, took the high road and went to President Shimon Peres today and returned the mandate he entrusted her with last month to form a new government.

So barring some unforeseen blip, and owing to the convoluted manner the president and the Knesset parties must behave now, we’re looking at mid-Feburary for election day. And guess who’s prime minister til then? Ehud Olmert.
Ain’t Israeli politics grand?

I’m actually looking forward to the campaigning, because the televised election ads are among the most entertaining moments of TV since the original Saturday Night Live in the mid-1970s.

That’s about the only consolation to the whole ordeal, because whether Livni and Kadim come out on top again (highly unlikely), the Labor Party and Ehud Barak make a comeback (even unlikelier), or the Likud and Bibi Netanyahu clean up (Lord help us because it’s very likely), the resulting coalition will be very similar to The Who’s “Won’t Get Fooled Again”, which goes “Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.”

I’m sure that despite the fateful issues and decisions facing us, the next elections will have a record low turnout. Until we start producing some new blood and new ideas, more and more Israelis are going to continue turning off to politics. And it’s a time when we can ill afford to leave our fate to others to decide.

Maybe the environmental Green Party will finally galvanize voters and become this next election’s Pensioners’ party or Shinui – a dark horse coming out of nowhere.to capture the minds and hearts of the population.

 

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