Forget the fatigue: Why Israel's fourth elections matter

+972 Magazine
Haggai Matar | Executive Director

On Tuesday, Israeli citizens will cast their votes for the fourth (!) time in two years. At this point, it is completely understandable to feel numb, indifferent, or simply bored with what feels like a never-ending story of Israeli elections. All of this has happened before and quite possibly will happen again in a few months’ time.

Yet despite the cynicism and apathy, the stakes are immense and these elections deserve our close attention. The final polls published over the weekend show Netanyahu’s extremist right wing coalition taking 60 of the Knesset’s 120 seats. If these polls are to be trusted, Netanyahu is just one seat shy of a ruling majority, and he could get that one seat either by persuading more voters in the final days of the campaign, or by getting members of Knesset in the anti-Netanyahu bloc to desert and join him, as he has done in the past.

If one of these likely scenarios comes to pass, Israel will be governed by the most far right coalition in its history. Such a government would likely remove the final checks and balances still in place in the halls of power; cancel Netanyahu’s corruption trial; and totally defang the judiciary.

The alternatives are not too promising either. As right wing parties — including those in the anti-Bibi bloc — are likely to win a total of 100 out of 120 Knesset seats, any other government would likely be just as bad for Palestinians, the struggling and growing poorer classes, the climate, etc. In that sense, a fifth round of elections may still be the best thing we can hope for at the moment.

A Netanyahu government will dismantle all the mechanisms that still allow for some internal opposition within Israeli society. Without those, fighting for a better future for everyone living in Israel-Palestine will become much harder and more perilous. That should concern all of us.