Israel’s senior class meets the president
Filed under: A New Reality, General, History and Culture, Israeliness, Life, Social Justice
President Shimon Peres with members of the 'senior class.' (Photo: Meytal Yeslovitz)
At the beginning of the 1990s, approximately 3.6 per cent of Israel’s population was aged 75 and over. In 2009, the ratio climbed to 4.7 per cent.
As the ratio of senior citizens continues to grow in Israel, like in populations around the world, the government is adopting new policies geared towards the needs and aspirations of the third age sector of society. Likud MK Lea Ness is the deputy minister in charge of the ministry for senior citizens.
Ness was there on Sunday, when Peres hosted nine hand-picked senior citizens to visit Beit Hanassi for the launch of the special month. And for once, Peres wasn’t the oldest person in the room, The Jerusalem Post reported.
“Among them writer and lecturer Geula Bat Yehuda Raphael, 92, who is the widow of former Minister for Religious Affairs Yitzhak Raphael, educator Adam Ben Chanoch, 89, who founded the school on Kibbutz Kfar Hanassi, where he and his wife Ilse have lived for 62 years, and who now volunteers twice a week as an education counselor at the Hula Valley high school; Issaschar Goldstein, 101, who was seriously injured in the riots of 1939 and later owned the legendary Tnuva café in Jerusalem, as well as the Patt gas station.
Others just slightly younger than Peres, but certainly part of his generation, included former Druze MK, Amal Nasser el-Din, 82, who is both a bereaved father and grandfather having lost two generations of his family who were killed on active duty in the IDF, and who now devotes much of his time to advocating peace and equality; singer of the underground movements and former member of the Palmach Shulamit Livnat who is the mother of 60 year old Culture and Sports Minister Limor Livnat; Margalit Zanati, 79, whose family has lived uninterrupted in Pe’ekin since the period of the Second Temple; Bilha Castel, the widow of renowned artist Moshe Castel, whose mural and other works are on permanent display at Beit Hanassi; geography and cartography expert Dr. Shimshon Livni who was one of the founders of Kibbutz Lahav in the Negev.”
Ness, who introduced each of the special guests to Peres, said that today, every 10th person in Israel is a senior citizen, and that in round figures, the total number of senior citizens is 750,000. The forecast for the year 2030, she said, was that the number of senior citizens in the country would be equal to the number of children.
Peres greeted each guest and asked inquisitive questions about their health and longevity, as if he needed any tips. In his closing remarks, he said, “To be a senior citizen is not a sin, but a matter of pride. An elderly person can still grow older and make a valuable contribution along the way based on the experience gained in living for so long.”
He certainly sets a good example.
New Knesset elected, coalition talks underway
Filed under: A New Reality, General, History and Culture, Politics
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.
Israel elections a defeat for everyone
Filed under: A New Reality, General, Israeliness, Politics, Pop Culture
The Siamese twins of Israeli politics.
If last night’s voting tally – showing a slight victory for Kadima and Tzipi Livni over the Likud and Bibi Netanyahu, but overall a stronger showing by the Right block – proves anything, it’s that our electoral system is as irreparably fractured as the population of the country.
We’re in a situation where the party that received the most votes is going to likely end up out of the government and in the opposition – sort of like Al Gore and the Democrats in 2000. Netanyahu, instead of graciously accepting defeat and offering Livni the opportunity to form a coalition – a task she failed to do last year which resulted in these elections, and which she’s unlikely to do now – instead claimed a from the back end victory.
While smaller Right wing parties like Habayit Hayehudi and the National Union sapped votes from Likud – not to mention Israel Beiteinu and Avigdor Lieberman maintaining their strong showing of 2006 despite predictions they would do even better – Kadima undoubtedly lost a mandate or two from those well-meaning souls who gallantly but gullibly threw their support to the Green Movement-Meimad or the Green Leaf parties.
The spread of parties in the next Knesset, therefore, is going to continue to be a representation of the total schism in Israel society, where Arab parties, the Sephardic stronghold Shas, the waning Left faction Meretz, and the fringe Right Wing parties all sit together and cause a paralysis.
It’s time to raise the minimum threshold to even run for the Knesset by 1,000 percent or so, and cap the number of parties to 10 maximum, instead of this year’s unmanageable, outrageous 34. It may not be democratic, but neither is the government we’re going to get next.
What in the world made people like Ephraim Sneh or Michael Melchior think they could garner enough votes to even get one Knesset seat? Can anyone name a difference between Habayit Hayehudi and the National Union? the Green Movement and the Greens? And for that matter, Kadima and Likud?
If the politicians really believed their mantra that the good of the country comes first, then next week, we would see a coalition announced consisting of Kadima, Likud, and either Labor, Israel Beiteinu or Shas. But don’t think for a second that’s going to happen.
Ah, the hell with it. I’m going to bury my head in the new Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue with Israel’s own Bar Refaeli on the cover. At least that’s something we can take pride in.
The Itzik Theory in the Israeli elections
Israel Beiteinu leader Avigdor Lieberman
The end result is that the two Right-leaning parties may end up cancelling each other out, leaving Kadima with the most seats on Tuesday. However, as Gil Hoffman pointed out in today’s Jerusalem Post, just because you get the most seats doesn’t neccessarily mean you’ll end up being asked by the president to form the coalition. It’s a combination of that, plus an overall look at how many seats the Right bloc gained versus the Left, and perhaps most importantly, which party the other parties advise the president during post-election consultations to deposit the authority of forming the next government coalition to. And according to Hoffman, an overwhelming majority of MKs will advise President Shimon Peres to give that responsbity to the Likud and Netanyahu, no matter the outcome of Tuesday’s elections.
But I feel pretty confident going out on the limb and predicting that Likud will end up topping the list of vote getters on Tuesday. If only because of Itzik.
He’s a 22-year-old resident of Ma’aleh Adumim, and a player in my weekly Shabbat touch football game. Recenly demobilized from the IDF, Itzik has a great, self-deprecating sense of humor, a twinkle in his eye, and like alot of young, Right-leaning Israelis, a has a strong hint of racism against Palestinians and Arab citizens of Israel.
He doesn’t really differentiate between the two, and being brought up on a sea of Palestinian terrorism, from the first Intifada, on down through the rocket attacks on Sderot that prompted the latest war in Gaza, he wants as little to do with Arabs as possible.
Quite naturally, he’s a big supporter of Lieberman. But he’s going to vote for Likud. “Bibi’s obviously going to give Lieberman a very senior cabinet position, so he’ll have alot of authority in the next government. So, I don’t see any reason to vote for Israel Beiteinu, we have to make sure Likud beats Kadima,” he explained during a break in the game.
So, extropolating a little, Israel Beiteinu might actually lose a little support and gain less than the 18 or 19 seats the polls predict. But that’s only because their supporters are going to prop up Likud to ensure a Right victory on Tuesday. That, at least, is the Itzik Theory.
Getting Ben-Gurion high, and other TV ads
Filed under: General, Israeliness, Politics, Pop Culture
It’s here – the only redeeming aspect of the Knesset election campaign – the television ads!
Tonight beings the perennial ritual of the screening of the TV ads developed by the political parties running for the Knesset. Instead of airing them whenever they buy the air time, the three main Israeli channels – 1, 10 and 22, group the ads together in preset blocks of time. So tonight for instance, Channel 10 has been given the hour slot begining at 6 pm for those that just can’t wait, Channel 1 will air the aids at 10 pm and Channel 2 gets the late-night 11:15 pm slot.
The ads used to be screened in prime time, but there’s been a waning interest over the years among viewers, so they’ve been relegated to the early and late evening periods, and they’ll only be shown for two weeks instead of the traditional three. Still, the ads are always good TV and provide more laughs than any sitcom on the air.
Following the rich get richer mode of thinking, the amount of time each of the 34 parties receives for commercials is based on how many MKs each party has in the current Knesset, so Kadima will dominate the broadcasts and new parties will barely be seen, according to The Jerusalem Post.
Kadima’s ads are focusing on tearing down Likud leader Binyamin Netanyahu, who is leading in the polls. One ad depicts a polygraph machine as Netanyahu vowed to oppose the disengagement from the Gaza Strip, while a picture shows him voting in favor of the plan.
The Likud will go after Kadima leader Tzipi Livni, portraying her as indecisive and zigzagging – by supporting the Second Lebanon War but calling it unwinnable, and calling to topple Hamas while giving them money. The Likud slogan – “it’s out of her league” is purposely read by a woman so as not to look chauvinist, says the report.
The religious Shas party is adopting the tactics of President Barack Obama, by featuring the “Yes, we can” slogan, while the Left-wing Meretz-Hatnua Hahadasha ads have candidate Nitzan Horovitz drinking from a toilet to highlight the problem of water pollution.
The less popular the party, the more outrageous the ad, it turns out. The Power to the Handicapped Party will feature disabled people having sex to prove that they are abled, while the Green Leaf Party which favors legalizing marijuana will feature chairman Gil Kopatch smoking a joint on the grave of Israel’s first prime minister David Ben-Gurion.
Everyone’s happy now – the ad agencies have their creative juices flowing, the TV viewers have something to watch and talk about the next day, and the politicians are seeing themselves as God-like. Now, if all this only helped the voter decide who to vote for…
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