Confessions of an extremely reluctant Likud voter
Note: This is written in English because it's my mother tongue and even though I've lived in Israel for ten years and am mostly fluent I'm a lazy bastard and I find it easier to express myself in English. If you have a problem with it, feel free to bugger off.
This past Tuesday, Israel held elections. They were quite possibly the stupidest excuse for elections ever, held over the stupidest reason to break up an otherwise functioning coalition that was in the process of doing things, and the entire campaign process was the depth of stupidity. It was vile. More vile than I ever remember it being before. I don't think that there was a single party that didn't engage in fear-mongering, hate-mongering, filthy marketing, and dirty political tactics.
I have always been a right-wing voter. Ever since I turned 18, whenever I was eligible to vote in Canada I voted Progressive Conservative, and whenever I was eligible to vote in Israel I voted Likud.
This was the first time in my voting life that I didn't want to vote right-wing.
There's a number of factors that go into that. Israel's voting lines are not simply divided by right-left, but by religious, demographic, security, and social lines. When it comes to religious, I do not let that get in the way of my voting patters, as I have sworn to never vote for a party that identifies itself as religious. Demographic also doesn't matter, as I have sworn to not let demographics affect my vote. On social issues, I'm about as far left as they go - increased health care and education funding, increased recognition and support of the elderly and disabled, support for non-religious marriages, pro-choice, decriminalization of cannabis, decreased power to the Rabbinate's hegemony, etc and so forth. However, on security issues, I'm middle-of-the-road right (i.e. not extremist): Two states for two peoples is a great idea in theory, but right now there's absolutely nobody in the entire echelon of Palestinian leadership to make that happen. Severe punishment for terrorists or terrorist acts - Jewish or Muslim. Any negotiations on land will not touch established "settlements" (read: decades-old established towns or small cities). Palestinian self-determination means that they actually take responsibility for their fate, instead of funneling billions of dollars of aid to their leadership's private bank accounts instead of building infrastructure and then blaming the plight of the Palestinians on the so-called "occupation". No territorial withdrawals without iron-clad guarantees that said territory will remain demilitarized. And so forth.
Both camps engaged in fear-mongering, in "us-or-them" threats. The Likud fear-mongered along the lines of security ("vote for us or we'll all die"), engaging in "it's us or the left" threats. The Zionist Union fear-mongered along the lines of domestic social issues ("vote for us or stay impoverished and homeless"), engaging in "it's us or him [Bibi]" threats. And the left-wing media, oh man, the left-wing media. Haaretz and Yediot Acharonot have been waging a campaign of character assassination, personal assaults, and political warfare against Bibi over the past few months. Whereas the right-wing media just kept to the "seriously, Livni?" line and other forms of mass character assassination.
Basically, to both camps, J'accuse. You have both been engaging in the vile tactics that you accuse the other camp of.
But here's the crux of the matter, if the election results are of any indication. Outside of Tel Aviv and the general Merkaz, Israelis are more afraid of having their very lives in danger. For as puerile, sophomoric, and pathetic Bibi's tweets were on "Yes the housing situation is bad, but Iran", the average Israeli is very concerned about security. Because at the end of the day, yes, having an income and a house is nice, but it's not worth anything if rockets are flying, terror attacks are constant, and there's a looming threat of nuclear annihilation.
This would be difficult to swallow for extreme leftists that spew opposite-end vitriol of Apartheid, Occupation, and those poor Palestinians. I get that, and for that, we have Meretz. (Which is why I would never vote Meretz, despite agreeing with their social policies, minus the financial incompetence.) But it would be nice if the Labour party would smarten up to the reality outside of Tel Aviv. I mean, hell, even Ha'aretz published an opinion piece by Eyal Gross (in Hebrew, if you prefer, though it seems like the English version is free but the Hebrew isn't) sorta almost kinda to that effect.
I am very disappointed that I had to vote Bibi. He is bringing nothing new to the social-domestic situation, seems to be determined to let it deteriorate even further, and right now there's talk of Litzman asking for the Health portfolio (to the uninitiated, Yaakov Litzman was hands-down the worst politician that has ever held the Health portfolio, is the reason why the health care system is on the brink of collapse, and is the absolute last thing we need given the state of healthcare in Israel), which is causing me undue amounts of swearing, more than I usually curse and cuss at the world. Yes, that's a side point. But still. Also, I voted Likud before Bibi's obnoxiously racist declaration that the Arabs are voting, most amazingly prophecied by the Joint Arab List. And I voted Likud before Bibi's backtracking on the Two-State Solution.
I would have voted Labour this time around if it wasn't for a) Livni and b) the failure of the left to understand the importance of security concerns for the average Israeli. Or, more to the point, a very accurate poem.
This past Tuesday, Israel held elections. They were quite possibly the stupidest excuse for elections ever, held over the stupidest reason to break up an otherwise functioning coalition that was in the process of doing things, and the entire campaign process was the depth of stupidity. It was vile. More vile than I ever remember it being before. I don't think that there was a single party that didn't engage in fear-mongering, hate-mongering, filthy marketing, and dirty political tactics.
I have always been a right-wing voter. Ever since I turned 18, whenever I was eligible to vote in Canada I voted Progressive Conservative, and whenever I was eligible to vote in Israel I voted Likud.
This was the first time in my voting life that I didn't want to vote right-wing.
There's a number of factors that go into that. Israel's voting lines are not simply divided by right-left, but by religious, demographic, security, and social lines. When it comes to religious, I do not let that get in the way of my voting patters, as I have sworn to never vote for a party that identifies itself as religious. Demographic also doesn't matter, as I have sworn to not let demographics affect my vote. On social issues, I'm about as far left as they go - increased health care and education funding, increased recognition and support of the elderly and disabled, support for non-religious marriages, pro-choice, decriminalization of cannabis, decreased power to the Rabbinate's hegemony, etc and so forth. However, on security issues, I'm middle-of-the-road right (i.e. not extremist): Two states for two peoples is a great idea in theory, but right now there's absolutely nobody in the entire echelon of Palestinian leadership to make that happen. Severe punishment for terrorists or terrorist acts - Jewish or Muslim. Any negotiations on land will not touch established "settlements" (read: decades-old established towns or small cities). Palestinian self-determination means that they actually take responsibility for their fate, instead of funneling billions of dollars of aid to their leadership's private bank accounts instead of building infrastructure and then blaming the plight of the Palestinians on the so-called "occupation". No territorial withdrawals without iron-clad guarantees that said territory will remain demilitarized. And so forth.
Both camps engaged in fear-mongering, in "us-or-them" threats. The Likud fear-mongered along the lines of security ("vote for us or we'll all die"), engaging in "it's us or the left" threats. The Zionist Union fear-mongered along the lines of domestic social issues ("vote for us or stay impoverished and homeless"), engaging in "it's us or him [Bibi]" threats. And the left-wing media, oh man, the left-wing media. Haaretz and Yediot Acharonot have been waging a campaign of character assassination, personal assaults, and political warfare against Bibi over the past few months. Whereas the right-wing media just kept to the "seriously, Livni?" line and other forms of mass character assassination.
Basically, to both camps, J'accuse. You have both been engaging in the vile tactics that you accuse the other camp of.
But here's the crux of the matter, if the election results are of any indication. Outside of Tel Aviv and the general Merkaz, Israelis are more afraid of having their very lives in danger. For as puerile, sophomoric, and pathetic Bibi's tweets were on "Yes the housing situation is bad, but Iran", the average Israeli is very concerned about security. Because at the end of the day, yes, having an income and a house is nice, but it's not worth anything if rockets are flying, terror attacks are constant, and there's a looming threat of nuclear annihilation.
This would be difficult to swallow for extreme leftists that spew opposite-end vitriol of Apartheid, Occupation, and those poor Palestinians. I get that, and for that, we have Meretz. (Which is why I would never vote Meretz, despite agreeing with their social policies, minus the financial incompetence.) But it would be nice if the Labour party would smarten up to the reality outside of Tel Aviv. I mean, hell, even Ha'aretz published an opinion piece by Eyal Gross (in Hebrew, if you prefer, though it seems like the English version is free but the Hebrew isn't) sorta almost kinda to that effect.
I am very disappointed that I had to vote Bibi. He is bringing nothing new to the social-domestic situation, seems to be determined to let it deteriorate even further, and right now there's talk of Litzman asking for the Health portfolio (to the uninitiated, Yaakov Litzman was hands-down the worst politician that has ever held the Health portfolio, is the reason why the health care system is on the brink of collapse, and is the absolute last thing we need given the state of healthcare in Israel), which is causing me undue amounts of swearing, more than I usually curse and cuss at the world. Yes, that's a side point. But still. Also, I voted Likud before Bibi's obnoxiously racist declaration that the Arabs are voting, most amazingly prophecied by the Joint Arab List. And I voted Likud before Bibi's backtracking on the Two-State Solution.
I would have voted Labour this time around if it wasn't for a) Livni and b) the failure of the left to understand the importance of security concerns for the average Israeli. Or, more to the point, a very accurate poem.