Seeking Asylum in Israel by Ben-Nun Gilad

Author:Ben-Nun, Gilad
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Migration, immigration & emigration, Jewish studies, Citizenship & nationality law, Middle East history, Islamic studies, Israel, Palestine, North Africa, East Africa
ISBN: 9781786721334
Publisher: I.B. Tauris

Electoral Punishment, Political Manipulation, and Anti-Migrant Convictions

As the election campaign evolved, the breadth and depth of the electoral shift awaiting the upcoming parliament became clear. In total, 53 out of 120 Knesset members found themselves exchanged for new candidates. The political map, while maintaining its left–right divide over security and foreign-policy issues, changed dramatically over the course of election night 2013. While most political commentators dreaded the prospects of yet another right-wing ultra-religious government coalition, even they did not see the rise of the centrist power block represented by the Yesh Atid party.

The Likud, which began the elections by joining forces with the right-wing Israel Beyteynu party, lost over 25 percent of its electorate, being reduced from 42 to 31 seats in the house of representatives. Rather than lurching to extremes, the Israeli electorate defied all expectations with its moderation and its rational choice of reinstating centrist politics at the top of the country's power system. Consequently, all extreme right-wing parties were ousted from parliament, having failed to clear the minimal electoral threshold.

As for SHAS, it clawed its way through the electoral turmoil that characterized the nineteenth Knesset elections, maintaining its powerbase at 11 seats out of 120. Yet under the triumvirate of Yishai–Deri–Atias, the party failed in its coalition negotiations and did not make it into the government. For almost 20 years, and through 10 coalitions out of 12, SHAS had been part of the Israeli governmental establishment. During all this time, it had enjoyed privileged access to generous government funding in both left- and right-wing administrations, as well as a strong influence in all spheres of Israeli policy through its cabinet-minister votes. The severing of the party from these positions of political power and its march into the opposition were rightfully seen as a colossal leadership failure, primarily attributed to the party's leader – Eli Yishai.

At a deeper level of political analysis, Yishai's failure, as well as those of the extreme right-wing MKs Ben-Ari and Eldad, was intimately connected to the general downfall of the Israeli extreme right wing in the nienteenth Knesset. Leading a hard line during the campaign and deliberately lashing out against secular portions of Israeli society, the Arab minority in Israel, and the African migrants, Yishai, Ben-Ari, and Eldad lost touch with their own electorate, who veered towards the diametrically opposed political pole. Arye Deri's last-ditch attempt to scrap the hard-line elements of the SHAS campaign were countered by Yishai's repeatedly obtrusive media remarks. These included lashing out against Russian Jews, as he questioned their Judaism, along with his extreme views on the Palestinian–Israeli conflict. Ben Ari's and Eldad's attempts to reignite anti-migrant violence in south Tel Aviv were notable by the simple lack of participants in their organized demonstrations – an omen of the public indifference toward the African migrant question.

It is within these parameters that one ought to understand the public disdain felt towards Yishai, Eldad, and Ben-Ari as they continued their anti-migrant onslaught long after the Israeli public had lost interest in the issue.

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