Voting for Apartheid: The 2009 Israeli elections

Journal of Palestine Studies

Volumn 38, Issue 3, 2009, Pages 72-85

  Yiftachel, Oren ^a  

^a BEN GURION UNIVERSITY OF THE NEGEV   (Israel)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

APARTHEID; COLONIALISM; ELECTION; ELECTORAL GEOGRAPHY; ELECTORAL SYSTEM; ELITE POLITICS; MILITARY GOVERNMENT; VOTING BEHAVIOR;

ASIA; EURASIA; ISRAEL; MIDDLE EAST; OCCUPIED TERRITORIES; WEST BANK;

EID: 70350462161     PISSN: 0377919X     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1525/jps.2009.XXXVIII.3.72     Document Type: Article

References (27)

1. See "Lieberman Submits Demands to Join Coalition: Toppling Hamas, a New Government System, and the Loyalty Law" [in Hebrew], http://news.il.msn.com/article.aspx?cp-documentid=14125118.
2. See "Senior Labor Leaders: 'We Will Not Sit in Government with Lieberman'" [in Hebrew], http://www.nrg.co.il/online/1/ART1/848/ 341.html.
3. When offered the foreign ministry post, Lieberman attempted to soften his colonialist image by declaring that he is willing to accept a Palestinian state and even to leave his home in the settlement of Nokdim if this would help peace. Yet his conditions for a fragmented, dependent Palestinian state, which includes parts of Israel proper through a notorious "land swap," while annexing most illegal settlements to Israel, is in itself a colonial agenda for Israel/Palestine. See Aluf Benn, "Trading Places," Washington Post, 14 August 2005.
4. As elaborated elsewhere, Arabs under Israeli control possess six main differentiated "packages" of rights and capabilities, all inferior to Jewish citizenship, determined by a combination of ethnicity and place of residence: (a) Druze, (b) "typical" Palestinian citizenship, (c) southern Bedouins, (d) Jerusalem residents, (e) West Bank residents, and (f) Gaza residents. See Oren Yiftachel, Ethnocracy: Land and Identity Politics in Israel/Palestine (Philadelphia: Penn Press, 2006).
5. For in-depth analyses of the Israeli ethnic regime, see Yiftachel, Ethnocracy; As'ad Ghanem, The Palestinian Arab Minority in Israel, 1948-2000: A Political Study (New York: SUNY Press, 2000)
6. Baruch Kimmerling, Immigrants, Settlers, Natives: The Israeli State and Society between Cultural Pluralism and Cultural Wars [in Hebrew] (Tel Aviv: Am-Oved, 2004)
7. Yoav Peled and Doron Navot, "Ethnic Democracy Revisited: On the State of Democracy in the Jewish State," Israel Studies Forum 20, no. 1 (Summer 2005), pp. 3-27
8. Ilan Peleg, "Jewish-Palestinian Relations in Israel: From Hegemony to Equality?" International Journal of Politics, Culture and Society 17, no. 3 (Spring 2004), pp. 415-37
9. Nadim Rouhana, ed., Citizenship without Voice: The Palestinians in Israel [in Arabic] (Haifa: Mada al-Carmel, 2004)
10. Yehouda Shenhav, Coloniality and Postcolonial Condition: Implications for Israeli Society [in Hebrew] (Jerusalem: Van Leer Institute, 2004)
11. Sammy Smooha, "The Israeli Regime: Civil Democracy, Non-Democracy or Ethnic Democracy?" [in Hebrew], Israeli Sociology 2, no. 2 (2000), pp. 565-629
12. Yiftachel, "Neither Two States Nor One: The Disengagement 'Creeping Apartheid' in Israel/Palestine," Arab World Geographer 8, no. 3 (Autumn 2005), pp. 125-30.
13. The status of the Gaza Strip is somewhat different, following the dismantling of Israeli settlements and retreat of the occupying forces in the 2005 "disengagement." However, as Israel has imposed a tight siege over Gaza, controlling entry, exit, population registration, and key economic factors, the territory remains under indirect occupation.
14. Although the Palestinians in Israel formally have the vote, Arab parties were never part of any ruling coalition and hence could not exert influence on the policy-making process. Even the Zionist Left (Meretz and pre-1995 Labor) always preferred joining the religious and right-wing parties in forming coalitions to forming a bloc with the Arab parties (barring one exception: Rabin's second term). This exclusion has worsened during the last decade, as any identification with the Palestinian struggle to end Israeli colonial control was used to brand Arab politicians as a "fifth column" inside the Israeli parliament, thus further reducing their already negligible influence.
15. Without these settler MKs, the colonialist bloc would not have a majority, its seats being reduced from 65 to 55.
16. See article in Walla Elections, http://elections.walla.co.il/?w=/ 2661/1431273&tb=/i/15820377.
17. See article in Politiko, http://www.politico.co.il/ article.asp?rId=1172.
18. See article in the Marker, http://cafe.themarker.com/ view.php?t=832199.
19. One exception is the small progressive Meimad religious party led by Rabbi Michael Malkior, an ex-minister in previous centrist governments. Meimad ran jointly with the Green Movement, but failed to enter the Knesset.
20. The I'chud Le'umi party, mainly representing hard-line West Bank settlers, conducted a provocative march through the town, causing massive demonstrations and rioting. It also sent a notorious Hebron settler to be an "inspector" in Umm al-Fahm on election day, again causing demonstrations and riots.
21. The two camps emerged during 2004 and 2005. Though both remained officially within the Likud, they did not function as one party on many issues. When the split finally occurred, the group challenging Sharon's "leftist break," called "the rebels," remained in Likud, while most of Sharon's supporters formed Kadima that year.
22. The 2003 Likud vote, which elected 38 MKs who (as already noted) later split down the middle along colonialist vs. ethnocratic lines, is a good example of these blurred distinctions. Moreover, Israel's ethnocratic parties have supported for decades (implicitly or explicitly) colonialist policies in the occupied territories, and have implemented internal colonialist policies with respect to Israel's Arab minority. The main difference is in their rhetoric and official platforms regarding the necessity of eventually partitioning Israel/Palestine into two sovereign states. Ehud Olmert, the leader of Kadima and Israel's outgoing prime minister, was most explicit in this, advocating (in rhetoric at least) a near total Israeli withdrawal from the occupied territories (see, for one of many examples, Ethan Bronner, "Olmert Says Israel Should Pull Out of West Bank," New York Times, 29 September 2008).
23. Importantly, the conditions under which such a "state" would be established differed considerably from what is prescribed by international law or what would be acceptable to the PLO or most Palestinians. Even so, and although never translated into concrete political action, the existence of such a majority was a historic moment in Israeli politics.
24. The sharp drop in 2001 participation was due to a one-time boycott declared against the special elections for Israeli prime minister following the "October events" of 2000 where 13 unarmed Arabs were killed by the police; no Arab parties ran in 2001, and hence were unaffected by the boycott.
25. On the situation of the Bedouins, see Oren Yiftachel, "Epilogue, Studying al-Naqab Bedouins: Toward a Colonial Paradigm?" Hagar: Studies in Culture, Polity and Identities 8, no. 2 (Autumn 2008), pp. 173-92.
26. Bishara served in the Knesset from 1996 to 2007, when he left Israel and resigned his post while under investigation for treason and corruption, charges he denies.
27. See, for example, "Israeli Opinion Regarding Peace with the Palestinians," www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/ Society_&_Culture/ispopal_2008.html.