JEWISH $3.00 Frontier E~ectiaW %eye WILL ISRAELIS BACK BIBI ON MAY 17th? Book Reviews • JEWS : The Essence and Character of a People by Arthur Hertzberg • Messianism, Zionism and Jewish Religious Radicalism by Aviezer Ravitsky YOUTH INACTION : GARIN 2000 IN MEMORIAM : Aviva Kaufman Penn SINCE-1934 • A LABOR ZIONIST JEWISH CONTENTSVol. LXVI, No. 1 (636) JANUARY/FEBRUARY 1999 Frontier Israel 3 SINCE 1934 NEW ELECTIONS AFTER ALL Susan Hattis Rolef e 6 A LABOR ZIONIST JOURNAL POLITICAL STORMS Misha Louvish Founders Biography 9 Hayim Greenberg A BURNING BUSH: MOSHE SNEH David Rosenthal Marie Syrkin 16 MASTER SPY ELI COHEN Joseph Adler Editorial Board Henry Feingold, Chairman Books 22 Saul B . Cohen JEWS: THE ESSENCE AND Hyman Faine CHARACTER OF A PEOPLE Jonathan J. Goldberg Emanuel S. Goldsmith by Arthur Hertzberg and Jerry Goodman Aron Hirt-Manheimer Haim Chertok Rabbi Mark W. Kiel Chava Lapin MESSIANISM, ZIONISM AND 24 Judy Loebl JEWISH RELIGIOUS RADICALISM Jeffry V Mallow Daniel Mann by Aviezer Ravitsky Jack Fischel Mordecai Newman Samuel Norich In Memoriam 26 Michael S . Perry AVIVA KAUFMAN PENN Elaine S. Mann Mark Raider Eduardo Rauch HINDA KATZMAN 25 Ezra Spicehandler Phyllis Sutker In the Movement 28 David Twersky GARIN 2000 - THE REAL DEAL Ezra Weinberg THE INTERNATIONAL 30 INSTITUTE AT BET BERL Nahum Guttman Contributors 31 Editor Poetry 31 THE CONFERENCE Edmund Pennant NOTE TO SUBSCRIBERS If you plan to move, please notify FLYING KITES IN PELHAM us six weeks in advance . A SURVIVOR'S LEGACY 29 TO HER CHILDREN Judith Sherman JEWISH FRONTIER (ISSN-0021-6453) is published bi-monthly by Labor Zionist JEWISH FRONTIER Letters, Inc. Editorial and advertising offices at 275 Seventh Avenue, New York, NY 10001 . Periodicals postage paid at New York, NY . 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Distributed by Bernhard De Boer, Inc ., 113 East Centre St ., Nutley, NJ 07110. 2 JEWISH FRONTIER ISRAEL New Elections After All By Susan Hattis Rolef n December 21, 1998, the Knesset passed First, there was the stubborn opposition aO bill for the early dissolution of the Knesset . In among certain members of the Coalition to the first reading, 81 Members of Knesset - includ- Wye Plantation Agreement and Netanyahu's ing Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and ambivalence regarding the Agreement's imple- Minister of Defense Itzik Mordechai - voted in mentation . On the other hand there were favor of the bill, and 30 voted against . Despite those in the Coalition who supported the the fact that he voted in favor of early elections, Agreement (including Minister of Defense in his speech Netanyahu made a faint, last- Itzik Mordechai), who were disturbed by minute offer in the Labor Party to join a na- Netanyahu's ambivalence, for the opposite tional unity government an offer he knew reasons. would be rejected out of hand, and which was Second, as the month of December rapidly made to try and gain some points with the gen- came to a close, the Government was unable to eral public ("You see, I offered national unity- get its budget for 1999 through . After several it was Labor that rejected it!") . The following weeks of arguing that without the support of week the Knesset Constitution, Law and Jus- all sections off the Coalition for the budget and tice Committee decided that elections would be the economic goals that it aspired to attain, held on May 17 - exactly 22 years after the the Government could not continue to func- elections to the 9th Knesset, which for the first tion . Minister of Finance Yaacov Ne'eman, who time brought the Likud to power . On January had actively supported the idea of forming a 4, 1999, the Knesset passed the early dissolu- national unity government, decided to resign .' tion in second and third reading . This time 85 Even before Ne'eman announced his intention MKs voted in favor and 27 against . Speaker to resign, Netanyahu tried to bolster up his Dan Tichon abstained and Netanyahu didn't coalition by offering the Ministry of Finance to show up. the leader of Gesher, David Levy, who earlier The Knesset's decision to dissolve itself re- this year left the Ministry for Foreign Affairs flected a widespread feeling, both within the with a huff and a puff. But very soon, and true Opposition and the Coalition, that Netanya- to character, Netanyahu managed to hurt hu's Government had reached a dead-end, and Levy's feelings, and Levy returned to his cor- that there was no way out of this situation . ner sulking . That the Opposition should have reached that Third, independently of any particular is- conclusion is not surprising, but the Opposi- sue, there was growing opposition among tion was joined by close to half the Members of Likud Ministers and Knesset Members to Knesset from the Coalition . A combination of reasons convinced numerous members of 1 In the Summer of 1998 Ne'eman had acted as an inter- the Coalition that early elections were desir- mediary between Netanyahu and Labor leader Ehud able (or unavoidable) - all connected with the Barak in an attempt to work out the basis for a national unity government, but despite progress in working out incoherence of the Government, on the one the basic guidelines for such a government, the attempt hand, and Netanyahu's character and style, on failed . The final death blow to the initiative was Netan- the other. yahu's aggressive attack against the Labor Party after his return from Wye Plantation . .JANUARY/FRRRUARY 1999 3 Netanyahu's broken promises and fickle lead- elections to 32 in 1996 while the Likud went ership, the sole goal of which seems to be the down from 32 to 22), will emerge further weak- Prime Minister's own political survival, at any ened. This is not just because of the desertions cost . Outgoing Tel-Aviv mayor, Ronnie Milo from the Likud and several expected deser- was the first senior member of the Likud to tions from Labor,' but also because the system leave the party. At the end of December he was enables and even encourages split voting, joined by two Likud "princes" - former Minis- which tends to strengthen the medium sized ter of Finance Dan Meridor, and later former parties at the expense of the large ones .:' Minister of Science and Technology Benny As to the contest for Prime Minister, at this Begin, son of former Prime Minister Mena- stage it seems as though there might be chem Begin. While Milo and Meridor turned as many as five or six contestants in the first to the Center, Begin turned to the Right . At round, including Prime Minister Binyamin the time of writing (4 January, 1999) another Netanyahu, Labor leader Ehud Barak, former two senior members of the Likud - Minister Chief of Staff Amnon Lipkin-Shahak, (possi- of Defense Itzik Mordechai and Minister of bly) Dan Meridor, Benny Begin, and Rabbi Communications Limor Livnat - are also con- Yossef Ba-Gad (a former Member of Knesset sidering leaving the Likud . It is believed that for Moledet, and something of a clown) . Even if if the two do finally decide to leave, Mordechai some of these personalities finally decide not will turn to the Center and Livnat will join to run, it is quite unlikely that any of the can- Begin . didates will manage to get more than 50% of Among those who object to Netanyahu's the votes, and therefore there will be a second leadership but nevertheless decided to stay in round of elections for the Premiership on June the Likud, Jerusalem Mayor Ehud Olmert 1. In the second round it is assumed that the considered contesting the Likud leadership, contest will be between Netanyahu on the one but decided to give up, when he discovered hand and either Barak or Lipkin-Shahak on that in the current Likud Central Committee the other. he cannot possibly win. Another Likud "prince" Strangely enough, the opinion polls still - chairman of the Knesset Foreign Affairs show Lipkin-Shahak as the only candidate and Security Committee Uzi Landau - has certain to beat Netanyahu thoroughly, even decided to challenge Netanyahu, with the sup- though he hasn't yet expressed clear positions port of former Likud leader and Prime Minis- on any issue, and formally hasn't even got a ter Yitzhak Shamir, even though he doesn't party. Lipkin-Shahak's appeal is his solid stand a chance . looks, his honest smiling eyes and the fact that so far he hasn't said anything wrong (or any- n Israeli politics four and a half months - thing right, for that matter) . Apparently Lip- the time left until the elections - are a very kin-Shahak will join up with Milo (who has longI time, and at this stage it is very difficult already got a registered party), but currently it to guess what will happen in the course of this is not yet clear whether he will manage to get period.