Journalistic commentators and pundits weren’t the only ones surprised by the results of Israel’s national elections on Jan. 22.
Several Israelis living in Wisconsin said they also felt surprised to learn that Israelis did not give a strong mandate to the right wing, as many observers had predicted.
Instead, Israeli voters reduced from 42 to 31 the number of seats Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s combined right wing Likud Party-Yisrael Beiteinu (Israel is Our Home) Party has in the coming 120-seat Knesset.
Voters also gave a second place of 19 seats to a new and centrist party, Yesh Atid (There is a Future), headed by political newcomer Yair Lapid.
“I think everyone was surprised by Lapid” and “how strong” his showing was, said Ro’ee Peled in a recent interview. Peled and his wife Michal Makov-Peled are the current Israel emissaries to Milwaukee and directors of the Milwaukee Jewish Federation’s Israel Center.
Peled added that he also was surprised by the large voter turnout in Israel. According to statistics released Jan. 23 by Israel’s Central Elections Committee, about 3.8 million Israelis, or almost 67 percent of eligible voters, cast ballots, the highest percentage since 2003.
Israelis, Peled said, were thereby “celebrating democracy.” He said he had heard that individual Israelis weren’t just voting themselves, but “made sure their friends were going to vote as well.”
This election demonstrated how “we have a very strong democracy” in other ways, Peled said. A record number of women have seats in the new Knesset — 26 — and three of the parties are headed by women.
In addition, the Knesset will have an unusually large number of first-time members — 53 — who will have to “take some time to learn their parliamentary work,” Peled said.
Yehonatan Hazani Zion also said in a telephone interview that he was surprised by both the results and the turnout. Zion is the Israel emissary to the Jewish Federation of Madison.
“People want to change [and] it is important to make a change” in the direction of “a more moderate government,” said Zion, who emphasized that he was expressing his personal views, not those of any organization.
Ophir Ben-Yitschak, who has lived in Milwaukee since 2004, said he felt “very surprised in a positive way” about the election results.
“My parents came to Israel in the 1930s” and helped to build what they thought would be “a liberal, democratic Jewish state that had respect for the rights of minorities,” Ben-Yitschak said in a telephone interview. “Over the past 30 years, I have been worried that Israel was taking a direction away from that initial goal.”
Instead, the election showed that “these values are still very strong within the hearts of the people of Israel,” he said.
Eti Ganin, who has lived in Milwaukee since 1994, chairs the Israel committee at Congregation Sinai. She said she has leaned to the right to the extent that “I still think [Israel doesn’t] have a partner” for peace negotiations in the Palestinian Arabs.
Nevertheless, she not only was surprised by the election results, but “I actually like it.” Ganin said she felt afraid Israel would move even further to the right, to the point that there would be “no chance for any solution.”
Now, Netanyahu “is still in power,” but “I was actually happy he got some lesson in humility,” Ganin said. For all her mistrust of the Palestinians, Ganin said she believed the Israeli government should be “trying to make peace there,” and she hoped there will be “some moderate” influence on the new government.
In fact, all four of these Israelis said they hoped the next Israeli government will be a broad-based coalition.
Peled said he is “hoping for a more balanced coalition. If you have only a left wing or a right wing government, it is impossible to lead, to take meaningful strategic steps.”
Both Zion and Ganin said they hoped the next coalition would not include either of the haredi Orthodox religious parties, Shas (11 seats) or United Torah Judaism (7 seats).
Ben-Yitschak, on the other hand, said, “I would like to see a coalition of all colors of the rainbow,” including “at least one of the Orthodox parties,” plus Yesh Atid and “one of the left parties, Labor [15 seats] or Meretz [6 seats].”
“I would like to see this because I think people living in Israel need to be united,” he said. “Israel is facing huge problems, not just the situation with the Palestinians,” but problems “encompassing all sectors of Israeli society… That’s why [the government] should be inclusive.”
However, one Israeli living in Milwaukee said he didn’t feel comfortable having his views of the elections printed.
Yoni Zvi has lived in Milwaukee 12 years, and has chaired past Israel Memorial Day and Independence Day events in the city. And while he is not living in Israel, “I don’t feel we have a right” to opine about Israelis’ political decisions. “We don’t know what they go through every day,” he said.
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