This week, Alpher discusses lessons learned by Israel's center-left following its defeat to Netanyahu; Low likelihood of a Netanyahu-Herzog unity government; The state of US-Israel relations following Netanyahu's statements on the two-state solution and on Arab citizens' voting.
Update: this action, now closed, ran in March 2015.
The recent Israeli elections definitively unmasked the real Benjamin Netanyahu.
On March 18, 2015, the day after Israel's general elections, Israeli political expert Yossi Alpher
was APN's guest on a briefing call analyzing the election results.
Washington, DC – Israel’s general election results are
a disappointment for pro-Israel, pro-peace Americans. They will undoubtedly make our objective even harder to
attain.
Pre-election polls and the overall atmosphere in Israel preceding the
elections provided us with hope for a government that would embrace the policies and values that we support.
It now seems like Israel’s next government will provide us with more of the same, if
not worse.
Moments like this are not new to us. Yes, they disappoint us, but we do not succumb to the disappointment. We know
that our fight to secure peace for Israel and its neighbors is a long-term fight. We care too deeply about
Israel’s future as a democracy and a Jewish state to cede the struggle over Israel’s future character to the
bullies and the bigots, the racists and the ultra-nationalists. We know that the only way for Israel to be loyal to
the vision of its founders, to be both a secure, morally sound Jewish state and a democracy, is to end the
occupation and reach a peace settlement with the Palestinians and the Arab world. Together with our Israeli sister
organization, Peace Now, we will therefore redouble our efforts to advance this objective, serving as a bulwark
against the rejectionists and the zealots, true to our core values.
This week, Alpher discusses what happened in these elections*; what the next government is likely to look like; how Netanyahu engineered such a dramatic come-from-behind victory, despite the polls giving Labor (Zionist Camp) an advantage almost until election day; whether there are winners here, besides Netanyahu; how Herzog and Lapid are likely to respond to their setbacks, and what “losers” on the right who are nevertheless likely to join the coalition are going to do; how to explain the phenomenon of Israel's seeming to be set on a right-wing course, with no end in sight; and assuming Netanyahu now forms a fairly cohesive right-wing coalition, what are the main challenges it will face.
On March 13, 2015, APN's Ori Nir was interviewed on Warren Olney's NPR nationally syndicated show,
To the Point, to discuss Israel's upcoming elections.
Israeli Elections: Initial
Analysis
Briefing call Wednesday, March
18th, 12 noon, Eastern Time
With Israeli Security Expert Yossi Alpher
Yossi Alpher is an independent security analyst. He is the former director of the Jaffee Center for Strategic Studies at Tel Aviv University, a former senior official with the Mossad, and a former IDF intelligence officer.
Listen to the analysis HERE.
It is safe to say that in the past two years construction starts for approximately 5,000 housing units
took place in the settlements. This huge jump in construction starts took place, according
to the CBS, mainly in the beginning of 2013, whereas in Peace Now’s data it was reflected only in 2014.
On March 10, 2015 the Israeli Central Bureau of Statistics (ICBS or CBS) published the number of construction
starts for 2014. According to the CBS, 1,344 new housing units started to be built in the settlements in 2014 and
2,829 units in 2013. Peace Now, who conducted a count of all construction starts based on aerial photos, reported a
higher figure for 2014 (3,100 housing units) and lower one for 2013 (2,243 housing units). So how much was actually
built?
With less than a week before Israelis go to the polls, Israel's leading political blogger Tal Schneider spoke with APN's Ori Nir about the pre-election trends and about what she would be looking for on election night. Tal's English language blog is here: http://en.talschneider.com/
Israel Elections: What to Expect -- with Tal Schneider from Americans for Peace Now on Vimeo.