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Home , Kadima, Mapai, Ofer Shelah, Yoav Kisch

Israel to expand coronavirus vaccine drive to all over-16s Alexandra Lukash, Adir Yanko| 02.03.21 YNET

With the number of Israelis turning up to receive the coronavirus vaccine dropping, the Health Ministry said Wednesday it is opening up the national vaccination drive to anyone over the age of 16. The ministry instructed the country's health funds to make the necessary preparations for the expansion from Thursday, but said efforts must continue to reach more people over the age of 50 who have yet to be inoculated. Health Ministry Director-General Hezi Levi told Ynet on Wednesday that the decision was triggered by the declining turnout for vaccines, which has left vaccination centers across the country standing almost empty. leads the world in the percentage of the population who have been vaccinated, with a massive push to administer the inoculations to the entire country by March. So far, more than 3.2 million of the 9 million Israeli citizens have received the first dose of the two-stage vaccinations, while almost 2 million of that number have also received the second dose. But ministry officials said Wednesday that there was only a small rise last week in the total number of over-60s - who are considered high risk from COVID-19 - who have received a vaccine. The officials also highlighted a 250% rise in seriously ill COVID-19 cases in people under 40 in the past month, which they attributed to the spread of a British mutation of the virus. The country last week also began vaccinating 11th and 12th graders so that they could take their matriculation exams without fear of being infected. Israel's daily coronavirus cases also remain high, with 7,919 new cases on Tuesday, indicating a 9.3% positivity rate. There are currently 1,074 people hospitalized in serious condition including 292 patients on ventilators. The death toll has also continued to climb, with 31 fatalities on Tuesday bringing the total number of people who have succumbed to the virus to 4,888. According to a poll aired by the Kan public broadcaster, 31% of Israelis were unsure about whether to get the vaccine and 36% worried about its safety. Uncertainty about vaccine effectiveness against some coronavirus strains has stirred speculation that Israel could rescind the exemption from quarantine now accorded to vaccinees. "I think that, naturally, the more we go down from ages at which the risk is higher, more effort has to be made to bring the population out to get vaccinated," coronavirus czar Prof. Nachman Ash said Wednesday. He said several hundred vaccine doses had had to be thrown away after they expired, unused, due to no- shows at clinics. Deputy Health Minister Yoav Kisch told 103 FM radio station that children aged between 12 and 16 may be vaccinated starting in April, pending regulatory approval, but that including the under 12s "will take at least another year." The government was due to convene Wednesday to decide on how and when to ease the restrictions of the country's third lockdown. The Health Ministry has advocated for restrictions to remain in place until late Sunday at least, while Defense Minister wanted to see some measures lifted as early as Friday morning.

Labor makes a comeback in latest election poll, giving anti-Netanyahu bloc clear majority | Feb. 2, 2021

An election poll published Tuesday shows Prime Minister Benjamin Netanayhu's party losing some support, while the bloc of parties seeking to replace him after Israel's March 23 election is growing to 66 out of 120 seats.

1 According the Channel 13 News poll, Likud would get 29 seats – three down from the network's previous poll, released last week. 's Yesh is down two seats from the previous poll, taking it to 16 seats. Labor seems to continue to gain confidence under the leadership of its new chairwoman, , and is up to eight seats, according to the poll. and Labor, together with Gideon Sa'ar's , 's , the , and Benny Gantz's Kahol Lavan – all parties that vowed to replace Netanyahu – are predicted to get 66 seats, giving the bloc a clear majority. Likud, together with ultra-Orthodox parties and , would get 44 seats, while 's party, which may or may not back Netanyahu after the election, would get 10. Mayor Ron Huldai's The Israelis party would not pass the 3.25-percent electoral threshold, according to the poll, and neither would Tnufa, led by former Yesh Atid's number 2, Ofer Shelah. A potential merger of Labor, The Israelis and Tnufa, according to the poll, would get 11 seats. In the likely scenario in which the , which is one of four factions making up the Arab-majority Joint List, runs on its own, the poll predicts it would have just enough votes to clear the electoral threshold, with four Knesset seats. Should far-right parties National Union, Habayit Hayehudi and merge, the joint slate would get six seats, but take Netanyahu's Likud down to 27 and Bennett's Yamina to eight. The Channel 13 poll included 703 respondents; 604 of them are Jewish and 99 are Arabs. The margin of error is 3.7 percent.

For Israel's sake, Haredi parties must be kept out power Ben-Dror Yemini| 01.30.21 @ Yediot Achronot

It is difficult to express opposition to the relationship between Israel and its Haredi population without slipping into racism and even forms of anti-Semitism. But the Haredi community is currently at the center of public discourse and must be judged according to the facts. But when efforts are made to reduce the spread in their own communities and prevent it from infecting others, the response is often violent. The Sephardi ultra-Orthodox are not involved. They are for the most part in compliance with health regulations, which leaves us with the Ashkenazi sector. It is unclear what portion of that population is involved in the violation of lockdown restrictions and in the violence that we have been witnessing. The Ponevezh Yeshiva is a respected institution with 3,000 students and Chaim Kanievsky is a rabbi with many followers. So the claims that the troublemakers are just a renegade few cannot be taken seriously, even if others in the community may not agree with the rabbis. The recent wave of violence is just the tip of the iceberg in the contentious relations between Haredi Israelis and the rest of the county. This relationship has a long history of strife that began even before the establishment of the state. In 1948, Israel's first prime minister, David Ben Gurion agreed to grant an exemption from military service to 400 yeshiva students per year, despite the dire need for fighting men during the country's War of Independence. Just 20 years later, a parliamentary committee decided to increase that number to 800. But in 1977, after rose to power as the first Likud prime minister, all restrictions on the number of exemptions were removed as part of his coalition agreement with the ultra-Orthodox parties. Repeated efforts over the years to reach some agreement that would see Haredi men join in the national defense effort have failed. In 1974, just 2.4% of eligible Haredi men were excused from military duty. By 2010, that had increased to 16%.

2 In 2017, the real number of exemptions rose to 11,700 - and this will likely ho even higher. But the Haredi community receives more than a free pass for military service that most Israeli 18-year-olds have to complete. They are also recipients of a government stipend to support them in their Torah studies, and the budget for that has more or less doubled from NIS 638 million ($195 million) it cost in 2014. The Haredi education system refuses to include core curriculum subjects such as math, sciences and languages, but still receives funding from the Education Ministry. Turning a blind eye to this lack of education can only cause long-term damage. "Children who receive a third world education can only survive in a third world society," professors Dan Ben- David and Eyal Kimchi wrote in a report submitted to the National Economic Council. They warned in the report that the long-term cost to the country and the Haredi community itself would be devastating. Without a review of the ultra-Orthodox community's relations with the state, we are surely marching towards the abyss. The recent violence, though dominating the news headlines, is but a footnote in an ongoing story. This has long been an impoverished and ill-educated sector of the population that is accustomed to receiving state hand-outs. There is no need to abolish the yeshiva world. Torah students need not be dragged into the military induction centers, but the secular leaders must stop kowtowing to religious powers. Dialogue will not help. Israel needs a government that represents the secular majority and keeps the Haredi politicians away from power. This is the only way to resolve this issue - both for the good of the country and its ultra-Orthodox citizens.

Where have all the parties gone? Naomi Chazan, TOI, FEB 1, 2021

This is the busiest week in Israeli politics before election day. In the hours prior to midnight on Thursday — the deadline for the presentation of the lists competing for voter support — some pretenders for office will merge, others may break away from existing alliances, and still others may dissipate into thin air. In the process, leading personalities might withdraw from the fray, others might reemerge, and the race for position between those remaining will peak. The number of lists presented will, as in the past, far outnumber those that will eventually succeed in securing representation in the 24th Knesset — an indication both of the extreme fragmentation within Israeli society and the growing distaste with politicians and politics in general. Significantly, very few of these lists possess any of the attributes associated with political parties in democratic countries. They lack developed internal institutions, a local presence, minimal resources and, above all, coherent ideologies and detailed programs for grappling with the multitude of challenges facing Israeli society today. Even the most seemingly resilient agglomerations have become so weakened that they are hardly capable of fulfilling the main role of political parties in functioning democracies: acting as the prime vehicle linking citizens to their government by providing representation for the diversity of groups and ideas in society. Despite the multiplicity of electoral contestants it has sprouted recently, Israel is on the verge of becoming a no-party state. Too many instant lists, niche formations, personality-driven initiatives, change-oriented combinations, single-issue groups, and mood-oriented aggregations are very poor substitutes for robust political parties that serve to balance the abuse of power by those in office. There is a great difference between competitive electoral regimes (many with evident autocratic tendencies) and functioning democracies with robust political parties — especially in parliamentary multiparty systems such as Israel. These elections offer an initial opportunity, through the prudent choices of aware citizens, to prevent further deterioration and begin the process of resurrecting the bond between all segments of the Israeli public and strong parties capable of representing their needs and aspirations. Failure to do so will have serious consequences for the country’s viability. Israeli political parties have not always displayed so many striking weaknesses. For almost three decades since its creation (1949-1977), Israel was essentially a multiparty parliamentary democracy with a single dominant party (, later renamed the , or Ma’arach in Hebrew). During these formative years, 3 political parties sought to provide for the needs of their members “from the cradle to the grave,” including health plans, newspapers, women’s organizations, youth groups, trade unions, and, in some cases, education, employment, housing, and burial arrangements. Although heavily centralized and lacking in internal democratic mechanisms, they did mold a set of working institutions and created a cadre of professional politicians. This pattern was altered in the pivotal 1977 elections, when Menachem Begin and the Likud ended the Mapai hegemony and launched a period of two-party rule, with smaller political formations (including Dash, the , Shas, Agudat Israel, and some ethnic parties) holding the balance of power. Broad coalitions became the order of the day. Until the 1990s, however, despite a one-percent threshold, which accounted for the multiplicity of parties (ranging from a low of 10 to a high of 15), the bulk of the members of the Knesset represented large parties that commanded at least 25% of the electorate and, at times, over 40% of the vote. At this juncture, the party configuration shifted once again. First, the main parties began to open up, holding internal elections and eventually primaries. Second, the threshold was raised to 1.5% on the eve of the 1992 elections, temporarily reducing the number of parties. Then, in 1996 and again in 1999, a system of direct elections for the prime minister allowed voters to cast two ballots, spiking the number of parties to 15 in 1999 and, more significantly, reducing their size. By the time the dual ballot was eliminated on the eve of the 2003 elections, there were only medium and small lists — as party instability soared and volatility grew, with the emergence of centrist alliances, which, with the notable exception of Yesh Atid, have proven to have very little lasting power (, , Blue-White). This splintered party map has persisted to this very day. Despite the hike in the electoral threshold (to 2% in 2006 and then to 3.25% in 2015) that reduced the average number of parties, their average size did not increase. Indeed, during the past decade a two-bloc system (right vs. center-left) was instituted with the complete identification of the ultra-orthodox parties with the Netanyahu hegemony, overriding the possibility of fluidity in the construction of coalitions and effectively polarizing electoral politics. The last three rounds of elections entrenched this pattern, creating an almost inextricable stalemate. In the process, however, something much more serious has transpired: most political parties have unraveled, replaced by, at best, ephemeral electoral alliances. With very few exceptions (the Labor party, Jewish Home, and Balad), internal democratization has ground to a halt, as no elections have been held for party leaders or for Knesset lists. With little representative turnover, the lists have calcified precisely when there is a need for rejuvenation. The continuous electoral cycles have bankrupted most parties, rendering their branches moribund, their structures in tatters and their activities severely curtailed. Most lists — except Meretz, Gideon Saar’s New Hope, and Balad — have not published comprehensive platforms, their ideologies are assumed or unformed, and their plans of action — if they exist — are decidedly partial and short-sighted (vide Yamina’s program to combat the coronavirus or Yaron Zelekha’s economic recovery plan). Most new formations have highlighted the goals of leadership change (“just not Bibi”), while underlining the values of integrity, equality, accountability, and good government. They do not specify how they intend to promote these objectives or apply them to current exigencies. No number of splits, mergers, breakdowns, unifications or new initiatives appear to be capable of mending the inescapable precariousness of present political party constructs. The implications of this enfeeblement are far more widespread than might appear at first glance. Weak electoral frameworks threaten the already withering connection between Israel’s citizenry and its leaders, thereby accelerating neo-authoritarian tendencies, exacerbating the centralization of power and intensifying its personalization. This is especially true today, as the traumatic experience of the pandemic and its socioeconomic ramifications has created an almost complete rift between the government and an increasingly distressed public.

According to the latest poll of the Israel Democracy Institute, support for the Knesset stands now at barely 21%; trust in political parties has plummeted to an all-time low of 14%. Popular dissatisfaction — ranging from flouting directives, bypassing restrictions, defying closures to growing demands — has been articulated in diverse ways. The protest movement of this period is far more comprehensive and varied than its 2011 incarnation. Efforts to give it expression in the political sphere (“The Democrats,” for one) have yet to penetrate voters’ consciousness, while the coopting of individual activists by various lists might mitigate the crucial engagement of key elements of civil society in the critical period ahead. 4 The loss of confidence in one of the most important guardrails of democratic life inevitably threatens state resilience. It makes it even more difficult to govern, to enforce policies or, for that matter, to prevent the consolidation of autonomous enclaves not subject to state oversight. This institutional dismantling is far more profound than the scramble over the form and composition of the electoral lists themselves. The 2021 elections pose a very different set of challenges than did their 2019 and 2020 precursors. The emergence of anti-Netanyahu lists headed by Gideon Sa’ar and Naftali Bennett — along with the fragmentation of the center-left — unquestionably alters the political calculus. It also brings to a head the crisis of political representation in Israel. The lengthy process of rehabilitation will not occur overnight. It will, however, be advanced if citizens bear in mind that their ballot can be used not only to express immediate concerns, preferences, and aversions, but also to insist on the resuscitation of vital, interactive, party organs that are at the heart of democratic life.

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