Asher Arian - The Elections in Israel--1988

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The Elections in Israel1988

The Elections in Israel1988

Edited by
Asher Arian and Michal Shamir

First published 1990 by Westview Press, Inc.

Published 2019 by Routledge
52 Vanderbilt Avenue, New York, NY 10017
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN

Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business

Copyright 1990 Taylor & Francis

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.

Notice:
Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
The Elections in Israel1988/edited by Asher Arian and Michal Shamir.
p. cm. (Westview special studies on the Middle East)
ISBN 0-8133-7629-7
1. Israel. KnessetElections, 1988. 2. ElectionsIsrael.
I. Arian, Asher. II. Shamir, Michal. III. Series.
JQ1825.P365E446 1990
324.95694'054dc20

90-37872
CIP

ISBN 13: 978-0-367-29165-5 (hbk)

Contents

, Asher Arian and Michal Shamir

Part One
War and Symbols in a Protracted Conflict

, Gad Barzilai and Bruce Russett

, Hanna Herzog

Part Two
Voting Behavior in a Protracted Conflict

, Gad Barzilai

, Michal Shamir and Asher Arian

, Yoav Peled

, Ian S. Lustick

Part Three
Adaptation to Changing Conditions

, Samuel C. Heilman

, Gideon Doran and Giora Goldberg

, Paul R. Abramson

, Alan S. Zuckerman

Part Four
Protracted Conflict and the Formation of Government

, Asher Arian

, Dan Horowitz

Guide

We gratefully acknowledge the aidacademic and financialextended by various people and institutions. We express our thanks to the scholars who reviewed the submissions before the articles were accepted for publication; their anonymous comments were of considerable aid to the contributors and the editors. Thanks also to Tel Aviv University's Romulo Betancourt Chair of Political Science, Sapir Center for Development, Department of Political Science, and Faculty of Social Sciences for providing financial aid for the publication of this book. Lew Golan, our editor, had a difficult task and deserves special thanks. He prepared the manuscript for publication using the newest technologies available while editing it with the care and precision of an older time.

Asher Arian
Michal Shamir

1
Introduction

Asher Arian and Michal Shamir

I

Forty years after becoming an independent state, Israel is still involved in deadly strife with many of its Arab neighbors and with the Palestinians under its military control. The protracted Arab-Israeli conflict is one of the most fundamental features of the Israeli experience; it overshadows economic and social decisions, and often sets the political agenda. Not surprisingly, the conflict is not only an outcome of the hostility between the protagonists, but also a major resource within the system; those who control the timing and extent of security actions, and those who influence the content and form of communication about this issue, are often advantaged. Using the Arab-Israeli conflict as the organizing concept of this volume, we focus on how reactions to the conflict are reflected in voting behavior and coalition negotiations.

Barzilai and Russett open this collection by showing that the incidence of armed violence closely follows the political calendar in Israel: military action increases during the year or so immediately before the elections. This finding replicates studies of other countries, especially the United States. It is also similar to the finding that as elections approach, the economy is usually rejuvenated by injections of government money. (After the elections, the politicians take it backespecially during the second year, which is far enough from the next election to encourage them to make the country live more within its means.)

The security issue clearly dominated Israel's 1988 campaign. National consensus is a valued goal, and division is indicated by discourse within generally accepted parameters. Former senior army officers became involved in the debate over the territories in an unprecedented manner. First, the Peace and Security Council, with some 200 reserve officers with the rank of colonel or higher, announced that the security of the country would be furthered by exchanging territories for peace. The reaction came promptly: the smaller Security and Peace Council, also made up of senior reserve officers, stated that holding the territories was necessary for the security of the country.

Symbols have also been affected by the conflict. Herzog shows that the map of Israel has been widely used in political symbolism since before the establishment of the state. The symbol is constant, but the emotional and political content imparted to the map by different groups has varied greatly.

II

The 1988 elections were held on November 1, about a year after the beginning of the intifada (the Arab uprising in the territories which Israel had captured in the Six Day war). It was widely expected that the elections would be a referendum on the future of the territories. The country was more polarized than ever, and the platforms of the two major parties presented clear, opposing choices. While the forecast of a crucial election was not unreasonable, it turned out to be very wrong; those who had anticipated little change in Israel's political stalemate were closer to the mark.

The intifada forced most Israelis to think more realistically about the future of the territories and their inhabitants. It spotlighted obvious anomalies which had largely been ignored. International pressure increased for Israel to take a more conciliatory position toward the Palestinians. Much of the world's mass media gave negative treatment to Israel's attempted suppression of the intifada.

The two major parties offered clearly opposing views of the future. Labor came out in favor of offering territory for peace, and hinted at a form of confederation with the kingdom of Jordanthus relinquishing control over the territories while avoiding the creation of a Palestinian state. The Likud spoke simultaneously of three apparently irreconcilable goalsachieving peace, retaining the territories, and preventing foreign sovereignty in them.

Four of the chapters (Barzilai, Shamir & Arian, Peled and Lustick) look into the effect of the protracted Israeli-Arab conflict on the Israeli electorate in 1988. Barzilai examines the responses of a national sample just after the elections. Shamir and Arian focus on change within a sample interviewed twicejust as the intifada began, and again on the eve of the elections. Peled studies support for the extreme right-wing parties, and links it to conflicts in the labor market.

Rabbi Meir Kahane's Kach party did not run in 1988. On the basis of the amended election law, changed after the 1984 election, the Central Elections Committee disqualified the party because of its racist and antidemocratic stand. A new ultra-nationalist list, Moledet (Homeland), led by former General Rehavam "Gandhi" Ze'evi, won two seats. Moledet called for the transfer of the Arabs from the territories to Arab countriesa concept that had been introduced into political discourse by Kahane.

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