It could have been easy. January 22 was not a good day for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, but it could have been far worse. The 2013 parliamentary elections meant that for the first time in his long political career, he would be leading the largest party in the Knesset. Though his joint Likud-Beitenu list…
Israel’s recent election was dominated by discusion of how to integrate ultra-Orthodox young men into the military. But Israelis are now facing up to the possibility that in practical terms, nothing will change on this front during the new Knesset session. In the months leading up to the election, as calls grew for an end…
A new opinion poll shows that if Israel were to hold new elections today, Yair Lapid’s Yesh Atid party would win with 30 seats in the 120-member Knesset, up from its current 19, putting the former television personality in line to be prime minister, while Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud-Beiteinu would drop from 31 seats to 22….
The Jewish Agency in a resolution called on President Obama to grant clemency to spy-for-Israel Jonathan Pollard. The agency’s Board of Governors passed the resolution unanimously on Tuesday during its annual meeting in Jerusalem calling for Pollard’s release on humanitarian grounds. It notes that Pollard is completing his 28th year of a life sentence in…
A fascinating speech that Yair Lapid delivered last year has emerged. It offers a glimpse into his views on religion and secularity in Israel, and specifically on the role the Haredim play and will continue to play in Israeli society. For anyone interested in understanding what philosophy Lapid will be bringing to his role in…
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met on Thursday with Yair Lapid, the surprise runner-up in an election last month, to try to draw him into a broad government that could bridge Israel’s religious divide. In the Jan. 22 ballot, centrist candidate Lapid’s rallying cry, “equal sharing of the burden”, touched a nerve among voters angered by…
People overseas don’t understand the amazing success of Yair Lapid in Israel’s January 22 parliamentary elections. He hardly said a word about the Palestinians, the peace process, terrorism, war — all those things that Israelis are supposedly preoccupied with every waking minute. But I understand. For the past 15 years, I’ve been living in the…
Is there a future for Yesh Atid (There Is A Future), the party that was the surprise star of the recent Israeli elections? If past is precedent, the future of the new party is not promising. The history of parties that emerge suddenly out of nowhere strongly suggests that they return, in short order, to…
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