The Likud's Time Bomb

Likud-Wikipedia

It's very deja vu hearing all of the complaints frustrations from veteran, loyal Likud MKs once they recognize that yet again there are hardly any senior positions remaining for them. Those who've worked hard and shown their loyalty to Binyamin Bibi Netanyahu and the Likud, some for decades, have had to accept low-ranking or made-up positions, or none at all, as the good stuff has not only gone to coalition partners but also new and relatively inexperienced Likud MKs. At the same time they're not getting any younger. OK, they're not as old as the newly crowned King Charles of England who's barely a year older than Bibi himself.

Charles always knew that as long as he outlived his mother he'd get the crown, but it's not so simple in politics.

Please look at that chart above, which I copied from Wikipedia. Party leadership usually lasts about a decade. OK, yes, I know that Menachem Begin had been a party leader much longer, first Cherut, then GaHa"L and then finally a decade in the Likud. But the Likud party was cobbled together for the 1973/4 elections, and four years later was Begin's first victory and term as Prime Minister. He resigned/retired in 1983 and was replaced by Yitzchak Shamir who was party head for ten years, and then Netanyahu took over. 

Besides the six years of Arik Sharon seriously marred by his notorious Disengagement Plan, for most of that time and until today Binyamin Bibi Netanyahu has been leader of the Likud and Prime Minister of Israel. He was young when he took over the party, all of fourty-four 44 in October of 1993, and now there are many, many talented and aging Likud MKs younger and waiting in the wings for their chance to head the party. It doesn't look like they'll ever get the opportunity. Instead of competing against each other for leadership, there's Bibi holding onto those reins. He first grabbed them when they were still in school.

Anger and frustration are bubbling close to the surface. And it's not healthy for the party to have one leader for thirty years. It reminds me of, if you'll excuse the expression, dictatorships.  OK, I said it. What do you think?

Israeli Politics, Polls and Predictions

Considering that the norm in Israel is to have elections earlier than legally scheduled, the country always suffers a form of "election fever." Yes, think of it as a chronic "infection."

There's never a guarantee that your vote will produce an MK here in Israel.

Besides scheduled Knesset, remember that here the MKs are elected on party lists, not as individuals, Elections, there are two basic ways that elections can be called. One is that the ruling coalition loses a crucial vote which "brings down the government," and the second way is for the sitting Prime Minister to "call for early elections."

The Opposition has to grow to a considerable parliamentary strength for the first, which means that coalition MKs must have deserted the ship. Prime Ministers usually call for early elections when they think they can improve and expand their coalition. But that is risky, because as PM Netanyahu recently discovered; polls can change in a jiffy.

It's no secret that two young party leaders are dreaming of unseating long-serving Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu. They are Yair Lapid and Naftali Bennett.

Bennett is trying to do it from the inside and the Right. Leader of the NRP, now called Bayit Yehudi-Jewish Home, Bennett has had a rather turbulent relationship with Bibi. He's trying to make history by radically changing the NRP from perennial sidekick to national leadership.

Yair Lapid came from the Left, forming his own party, which has been evolving to more Center Right in his quest for the "big prize." And recent polls show that his Yesh Atid, There's a Future, is running neck and neck with Netanyahu's Likud.

Channel 10 Poll: Likud 26, Yesh Atid 25, Bayit Yehudi 13, Joint List 13, Zionist Union 10; Yaalon 0

But it's very possible that Lapid will have the same unpleasant experience that Tsipi Livne had a few years ago when she was at the helm of Kadima. Even though Kadima had scraped by with more MKs, than the Likud she wasn't able to form a ruling coalition. Bibi succeeded, and Tsipi is now just a postscript in Israeli political history.

Remember that Netanyahu hasn't lasted as Prime Minister all this time by chance. He's a very experienced and wily politician. I don't think that Bennett or Lapid will have an easy job unseating him. They'd have to join forces, sort of like the rotation that Labor and Likud tried in 1984 when Yitzchak Shamir and Shimon Peres took turns as Prime Minister. Yes, that's pretty hard to imagine, but the Shamir-Peres deal also seemed more like Political Science Fiction.

And what do you think?

I Sure Don't Envy Bibi Netanyahu!

Even though the Israelis voters spoke pretty clearly and do prefer Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu for another term of office, giving his Likud Party many more seats than they gave Herzog-Livni's, assembling a coalition won't be easy for him. Besides Naftali Bennett who has made it clear that he firmly supports Netanyahu and hasn't leaked any demands, all of the other party leaders are making it clear that they aren't in Bibi's pocket and expect a hefty payment, meaning important cabinet position for them and most of their MK's.

Just a couple of years ago, Netanyahu invited Avigdor Lieberman's party, Yisrael Beitenu to run with Likud on a joint list, which ended up to the benefit of Lieberman and detriment to Likud. This year, on its own, Yisrael Beitenu has lost strength, but it still has the power to make or break a coalition. Lieberman is playing hard to get, insisting that although he's leading one one of the smallest parties in Knesset, he still deserves a "senior position."

All during the campaign my feeling was that the Likud could not count on former Likudnik Kahlon at all in terms of joining the coalition. He'd be like the classic "woman scorned," even though he was the one who left the ship. And now the rumor is that he's going to play Bennett's old role dragging in Lapid as a "third and very unwanted wheel" as a condition for his joining a Likud government.

"According to Israeli television, Kahlon will demand that Netanyahu also invite his rival and erstwhile finance minister Yair Lapid into the government." (Jerusalem Post)

Yair Lapid's total lack of loyalty and discipline was one of the reasons Netanyahu had to declare new elections. And it was also Lapid's rabidly anti-Chareidi conditions that Bibi accepted which seriously damaged Likud's relationship with the Chareidi parties. And Netanyahu needs those MKs to form a coalition.

Nothing here is going to be easy. Voting and counting the votes are long over. The results are clear. The Israeli electorate does not want a Herzog-Livni government, not even just Herzog. It wants to give Binyamin Netanyahu another term of office, but the political leaders, MKs elected last week mostly have their own egos as priority, not the good of the country nor the will of the people.

As I've written before, I predict instability, and I wonder if Netanyahu will succeed in this seemingly impossible task. If he doesn't, then Herzog will get a chance to form a government coalition. And no matter who finally succeeds I doubt that the government will last very long. There is also a possible scenario that no coalition will be formed, and we'll be voting again this coming summer.

And don't forget that the media's rumor mill has been talking of President Ruby Rivlin pushing Netanyahu and Herzog to come up with a "National Unity Government," like the one that had Shimon Peres and Yitzchak Shamir trading places in the Prime Minister's office.

What do you think?

Jiminy Cricket, The National Union!

At this point, what should the role of the Ichud Le'umi, the National Union, be in Israeli politics, in the Israeli Government in Israeli life?

Caroline Glick admits that their policies are consistently correct:

THE ONE POLITICIAN who has been outspoken in opposing the mass release of terrorists has been MK Ya'acov (Ketzeleh) Katz, the leader of the National Union party. Together with the families of terror victims who oppose the government's intention to release their relatives' murderers, Katz has been the loudest voice in politics stridently opposing the deal. He has made clear that it will endanger the country and guarantee the murder and abduction of still more Israelis.
Katz and the National Union have it right on this issue. Indeed, they have it right on just about every major strategic issue they have championed. From their opposition to the failed Oslo process to their opposition to the failed Camp David summit, from their opposition to the withdrawal from south Lebanon and Gaza to their opposition to the failed road map peace process and the failed Annapolis peace process, the National Union has been right all along. It has always stayed true to its principles.

But as right as they are, she claims that to be wrong.

FOR ALL of its strategic wisdom and clearheadedness, the National Union is a political home for delusional politicians. In all of its various incarnations - from Tehiya to Herut to Moledet to the National Union - the party has never been able to understand what it means to govern. It has never been able to recognize that politics is the art of compromise.

But why should the only honest, clear-thinking party back down and conform to the Israeli PC delusions? Don't blame the National Union and its predecessors, Techiya and Moledet, for Israel's problems. Just like Pinocchio endangered himself and Gepetto by not listening to Jiminy Cricket, Israeli politicians who followed American orders, rather than do what was best for Israel, must admit their fundamental mistakes.

In 1992, angry that Likud under prime minister Yitzhak Shamir bowed to US pressure and participated in the Madrid peace conference, Tehiya brought down his government. In so doing, it brought in Yitzhak Rabin and Shimon Peres and brought the country the Oslo process and Yasser Arafat in Ramallah.
In 1999, angry at Netanyahu for bowing to US pressure and agreeing to the Wye Plantation accords, the National Union brought down his government. In so doing, it brought in Ehud Barak and Yossi Beilin, the withdrawal from Lebanon and the Camp David summit.

The Likud's tragic weakness has always been its desire to show that it's not an "extremist Right wing party."

That's why Menachem Begin defied his voters and supporters when taking office, in 1977, and gave the post-Yom Kippur War failed Moshe Dayan the authority to decide policy.

That's why Yitzchak Shamir agreed to go to the Madrid Conference and didn't pack and leave with a parting: "אין עם מי לדבר Ain im mi l'daber. There's nobody to speak to." After Arab terrorists shot at a bus full of innocent Israeli women and children on their way to a demonstration. The terrorists murdered two, my good friend and neighbor, Rachella Druk, mother of seven and the bus driver, Yitzchak Rofeh. A number of children were also injured. Shamir should have used this as an example of why it's impossible to negotiate with murdering terrorists.

That's also one of the reasons for Ariel Sharon's Disengagement policy which, besides destroying Jewish homes, towns, businesses etc and turning peaceful, innocent Israelis into homeless evictees, it brought Arab terrorist missiles closer to Israeli civilians.

Glick shouldn't blame Techiya. Shamir should have left the conference and apologized to Techiya and the Israeli People for his "momentary" weakness. Techiya would have then rejoined the government, and then we never would have had to cope with the increased terrorism caused by the Peres-Rabin Oslo Accords which gave even more advanced weapons to the Arab terrorists and facilitated the horrendous situation we're in now.

As a Techiya, Moledet and now National Union voter and supporter, I expect my party to be the conscience of the nation. Somebody has to be. Glick sure isn't. I don't want my MK's haggling over ministry perks like the NRP.

It took a while for Pinocchio to get it Right, and I hope we won't need to get swallowed by a whale first.

Give a Little Whistle

When you get in trouble and you don't know right from wrong
Give a little whistle! Give a little whistle!
When you meet temptation and the urge is very strong
Give a little whistle! Give a little whistle!

Not just a little squeak, pucker up and blow
And if your whistle's weak, yell, "Jiminy Cricket!"
Right!

Take the straight and narrow path
And if you start to slide
Give a little whistle! Give a little whistle!
And always let your conscience be your guide