ISRAEL UPDATE – NOVEMBER 11, 2002
A lot has been happening in Israel in recent weeks, but without doubt, the biggest news is that the country is once again heading for elections. Last week, the Labour Party, led by Defence Minister Benjamin Ben Eliezer, withdrew from the National Unity Government that it participated in with the Likud Party. The immediate cause for the withdrawal was the Labour Party’s refusal to approve of the proposed 2003 government budget, since it included $145 (approximately £100 million) of funding for the settlements in Judaea, Samaria, and Gaza. The Labour Party believed that this money should be spent in poor, underprivileged areas such as development towns.
Prime Minister Ariel Sharon was left with less than the majority he required of at least 61 of the 120 Members of Knesset (MKs) in order to continue effectively functioning as a government. Every time his coalition would want to pass legislation, it would be faced with the possibility of not having the support of enough MKs. He tried to bring in new parties to the coalition, but was unwilling to pay the heavy compromises that the National Union/Yisrael Beitenu Party sought.
So, with the support of President Moshe Katzav, Sharon asked to dissolve the Knesset and have new elections within 90 days, rather than waiting until November 2003 when, by law, there must be new elections. (In Israel, the President, elected by the MKs, has the power to dissolve the Knesset).
And so the race for yet another Israeli election begins! Although there have been many great successes of the Zionist Movement over the last century (revival of our ancient language, Hebrew, creation of a thriving culture, and creation of a modern state, to name a few!), it is clear that one area that needs a little repair is the unique electoral system that Israel has developed in slightly more than fifty years.
Until 1995, there was a nation-wide proportional electoral system. A political party that sits in the Knesset, or a party that has a list of at least 2,500 eligible voters and pays a financial bond (refundable if it gets enough votes to have at least 1 MK) is eligible to run in the elections. Each party prepares an electoral list (every party has its own mechanism to determine who is put on that list and in what order) of up to 120 candidates (just in case it receives 100% of the popular vote!). On election day, eligible voters (above the age of 18) vote for one political party. Parties who receive at least 1.5% of the popular vote get the number of seats in the Knesset that is proportionate to the percentage of the popular vote they received. So, for example, if party X received 25% of the vote, then it would have 30 of the 120 MKs.
Since the first elections for the Knesset in 1949, no party had ever received more than the 46.2% of the popular vote that the Labour Alignment received in the first elections after the 1967 Six Day War. In fact, rarely has a party received more than 35% of the popular vote. After the election results are tallied, the President summons the leader of the political party that received the most votes and asks him to form a governing coalition. Every government since the inception of the State has therefore had to build a coalition of various parties in order to receive the support of at least 61 MKs.
In the mid-1990s, the two largest parties, the left-wing Labour and right-wing Likud, tired of having to pay political ransom to a number of smaller parties in order to create a strong enough coalition to form a government, passed legislation to change the electoral system. The new law called for voters to cast two ballots, one for a political party (which would receive the number of seats in the Knesset in accordance with the percentage of the vote they received), and another for the Prime Minister. The two large parties believed that this would remedy the situation and give the directly elected PM more of an executive position similar to that of the American President.
Tragically, the plan failed. In the last election of the old system (one ballot for a party) in 1992, Labour received 44 seats and the Likud 32 seats, for a total of 76 out of the 120 Knesset seats. In the first election with two ballots in 1996, Labour received 34 seats and Likud 32 (total of 66), and in the 1999 elections with two ballots, Labour received 26 and Likud 19 (total of 45!). Rather than strengthening the position of Prime Minister, this new system weakened the PM’s party’s presence in the Knesset. Many Israelis ‘split’ their vote between PM and party, strengthening the smaller parties. So, although the Prime Minster was elected directly, he had even greater difficulty than previously in trying to form a governing coalition.
The two major parties succeeded in passing legislation in March 2001 to revoke the two-ballot system, and the current election will once again be based on the traditional system. It seems like the Israeli public, however, has not changed its voting style, as the most recent polls show that Likud stands to win 31 seats and Labour 19, totalling 50, and leaving the remaining 70 seats to be split between 13-15 other parties. Whichever party receives the largest percentage of votes in the election (either at the end of January or early February) will surely face great difficulty in constructing a governing coalition and will have to make many difficult compromises.
Just to confuse your, here are some statistics from the last decade of Israeli politics:
· Since 1992, there have been four elections, 3 for the Knesset, and 3 for direct election of the Prime Minister.
· There have been 5 Prime Ministers (Yitzchak Rabin, 1992-1995, Shimon Peres, 1995-6, Benjamin Netanyahu, 1996-1999, Ehud Barak, 1999-2001, and Ariel Sharon, 2001-2002).
· There are 18 parties represented in the current Fifteenth Knesset.
· The two largest parties, Labour and Likud, hold a total of 45 out of the 120 seats in the Knesset (37.5% of the representatives). The remaining 62.5% are divided among 16 other parties!
If it all sounds confusing, don’t worry, you are probably not alone! Stay posted for more information in the coming weeks. If you have any questions about the upcoming elections of the Israeli political system, please E-mail them to israelupdate@fzy.org.uk.
Want to find out more about the Israeli electoral system? Log onto the site www.knesset.gov.il, or even better, to http://www.knesset.gov.il/main/eng/engframe.htm.