The more the Labor and Hatnua parties shift to the left and sell the public false visions, the more they will push centrist voters towards Netanyahu.
In the past few years, Meretz has changed. It has shifted to the left, wiped off the difference between itself and Hadash, and organized joint activities with its new friend.
In the past, there were evident differences between the two parties. The former is openly Zionist; the latter never pretended to be Zionist. All that has been erased. Meretz may be paying lip service to the Zionist idea, but I doubt it would vote today for the formula of “a Jewish and democratic state.”
The Labor Party and Tzipi Livni‘s Hatnua were and remain clear Zionist parties. It’s slightly difficult finding any differences between them in the political area. They are both in favor of a Jewish and democratic state, and in order to support that there is no need for a useless nationality law which is already causing a lot of damage.
The problem is that it’s not clear. Occasionally, the Labor Party insists on setting its sights on the left, moving a bit too much to the left. For example, its cooperation with the Molad association. Most of this association’s activists are deeply rooted in radical left organizations, and its spiritual father is former Knesset Speaker Avraham Burg, who has undergone a changeover which makes him more of a partner in a coalition with Knesset Member Hanin Zoabi than with a Zionist movement.
And the affair with Peace Now, which sometimes confuses a justified struggle for peace with a struggle against Israel. The problem is that the Peace Now chairman is a member of the Labor Party.
Yair Lapid’s Yesh Atid party has yet to present a solidified political direction. It also suffers from a supermarket of ideas, stretching from Meretz to the center of the political map. In regards to the infiltrators bill, Lapid is dictating a slightly more mature and responsible stand to his party. It’s a matter of principle. If Tzipi Livni and Isaac Herzog drag their parties to oppose the law, it will be an alarming sign that they are drifting away from the Zionist center.
These parties should be reminded of the essence of the upcoming elections: The competition is not between Herzog, Livni and Lapid. The competition is against the nationalist-haredi bloc. The more they move to the left and sell the public false visions, the more they will push the centrist voters towards Benjamin Netanyahu.
Time and again, these parties find it difficult to present to the voter a sane, national and patriotic profile. Time and again, the justified critical discourse against Netanyahu turns into a discourse which dangerously begins to resemble the anti-Israel discourse.
If, for example, these parties argue that the peace talks orchestrated by US Secretary of State John Kerry failed because of Netanyahu, they will be lying consciously. I will not be part of them. But if they criticize Netanyahu for building the binational state, people will listen to them.
Moshe Kahlon‘s new party and Avigdor Lieberman‘s old party are in the background as well. They are both marching towards the center, and that’s a good thing.
The upcoming elections will not be about social or economic issues. It’s not that they are not important. They are very important. But most voters don’t think the leftist and centrist parties have a magical formula. The outgoing finance minister considerably increased the education budget. That’s important, but is that what will bring him more voters?
On the backdrop of the diplomatic moves launched by Mahmoud Abbas, who is succeeding in defeating Netanyahu in the international arena, on the backdrop of the growing strength of the global jihad, including Hamas, the differences between the parties can be found mainly in the political and geo-political area: How should Israel deal with the new threats? How should it fight Abbas? How should it avoid becoming a binational state?
In these areas there is a clear difference between the right and the center and between the center and the left. The left and the right suffer from blindness. The center should present a slightly saner and more realistic alternative.
So there is a need for unity, as long as it is.
