Knesset

Thousands vent fury over Israeli budget

Anshel Pfeffer — Fri, 17 May 2013 13:15:44 +0100

Nearly two years after hundreds of thousands of middle-class Israelis joined social justice protests against the government, the new state budget prompted further demonstrations last weekend.

Ten thousand people took part in the Saturday-night demonstration in central Tel Aviv, with smaller protests in other cities.

The protesters, who were joined by opposition MKs from Labour, Meretz and Hadash, called on the new Finance Minister, Yair Lapid, to revise the budget which he presented to the Knesset last week.

The budget, which is being passed nearly five months late due to the elections, has been roundly criticised in the media for placing most of the burden of cutting the deficit on the middle class while leaving corporation taxes and the wages of workers belonging to powerful unions largely untouched.

All levels of income tax have seen a rise of 1.5 per cent and VAT has been put up by one per cent. Workers with academic degrees will lose part of their tax exemptions, housewives will have to make national security payments, pensions will be taxed and child benefits cut.

In a press conference last Thursday, Mr Lapid said: “I would have preferred to give out sweets but we all understand the deficit must be closed. Everyone wants someone else to close the deficit.” He denied the budget came mainly at the expense of the middle class, saying: “For the first time, the working person is not the only one hurting. We raised corporate taxes and duties on luxury goods, and cut ministers’ and MKs’ salaries. This budget cuts sectors which were untouchable in the past.”

So far, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has backed Mr Lapid’s budget but, in an attempt to assuage public anger, he will probably attempt to reduce some of the tax-hikes and cuts.

One change to the budget has already been made — on Monday ministers decided to reduce by a quarter the planned cut of NIS 4 billion (£730 million) to the defence budget.

Jilted Ayalon testifies against Lieberman

Anshel Pfeffer — Thu, 09 May 2013 09:58:19 +0100

Two high-profile court cases this week saw dramatic testimonies.

In the trial of ex-foreign minister Avigdor Lieberman, who is accused of pushing through a fraudulent appointment, his former deputy, Danny Ayalon, was a damning witness.

Mr Ayalon, who was thrown off the Yisrael Beiteinu Knesset list on the eve of the last elections, told the court that Mr Lieberman had instructed him to appoint Zeev Ben Arye as envoy to Latvia.

“My acquaintance with Ben Arye was very superficial,” said Mr Ayalon of the diplomat who had illegally leaked Mr Lieberman confidential details of the police investigation into the then-foreign minister.

Mr Lieberman denies he was involved in the appointment. If he is found guilty of breach of trust, he could be forced to leave politics for seven years.

Meanwhile, in the Tel Aviv District Court, Yossi Olmert appeared as a witness for the prosecution in the trial of his older brother, former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert.

Mr Olmert testified by video link from the US. The prominent academic fled Israel in 2004 after accumulating huge debts in two unsuccessful political campaigns. The prosecution claims that he received millions of shekels in bribes from the recently deceased businessman Shmuel Dachner, a proportion of which was destined for his brother Ehud.

When questioned by police, Dr Olmert admitted to having accepted money from Dachner. In court this week, however, he claimed to not remember the source of money.

Now that one of its key witnesses has blown a hole in its case and with the death of its star witness, the prosecution must now decide whether it is worth proceeding with the case.

Israel plans massive funding cut to yeshivahs

Zoe Winograd — Wed, 24 Apr 2013 10:54:23 +0100

Israel plans to cut yeshivah funding by 30 per cent under the new Economic Arrangements Law.

The draft of the law, which was released this week, explained that by cutting funds to higher institutions, including yeshivahs, the country would save $93 million a year. The government plans to save money by changing the age limit that yeshivah students are able to receive benefits from the state.

The strictly Orthodox may be affected further if the law is to come in to effect. The draft law proposes a funding cut for state schools that do not teach core curriculum subjects such as mathematics and English. The law also stipulates that a child’s attendance in a state-funded kindergarten will depend on both parents being employed – potentially causing problems for parents who study in yeshivahs.

According to the Times of Israel, tensions between the Finance Minister Yair Lapid and members of the United Torah Judaism came to a head in the Knesset on Monday.

Member of UJT, Yaakov Asher said: “This attack on the strictly Orthodox public won’t bring salvation and won’t close the hole in the deficit.”

Rebel leader who took her protest into the Knesset

Orlando Radice — Thu, 18 Apr 2013 14:50:48 +0100

With her youth, bright-red hair and eloquent idealism, Stav Shaffir makes a striking symbol of resistance.

But there is much more to the 27-year-old than iconoclasm. As one of the leaders of Israel’s social-protest movement, she helped bring more than 500,000 on to the streets in 2011 to demonstrate against the government’s social and economic policies. And now, as a member of the Knesset, she comes with an enviable grass-roots mandate.

Against the advice of some of her fellow protest leaders, Ms Shaffir ran for election on the Labour list, and was voted into to the Knesset in January, the youngest-ever female MK.

For all the expectations that now surround her, Ms Shaffir, who was in Britain earlier this month to meet Labour MPs and talk to social-justice groups, is relaxed and, unusually for a political young-gun, does not speak only in terms of certainties.

Sipping on her cappuccino, she says it was not always clear to her that the aims of the protesters could be realised through politics. “I couldn’t trust politicians, and I wasn’t sure what to do as the social protests began to lose momentum,” she says.

At the same time, it was her proximity to Israel’s disillusioned generation that made her a recruitment target for politicians: “Whenever heads of parties asked me to join them, I said no, for about a year. We had much more influence on the streets.”

So how did a leader of a movement that opposes the political system decide to join the “other side”?

The shift was democratic: “We took the social movement on a tour and asked people what I should do. People over 35 said: you have to go into politics. Under-35s said: never get into politics.

“From that, I realised that I had to go into politics. Young people had become so sick of the system, and it needed to be changed.”

For observers, the “system” that was the focus of protest movement’s anger appeared to be economic. For Ms Shaffir, however, high rents and food prices are a symptom of a bigger problem: the Zionist “social contract” has been lost.

“The social movement was about the gap between the legend of Israel and reality. You grow up, you are supposed to become independent. Suddenly you see you can’t. You can’t buy a house. You work during your degree and it takes five years. Young Israelis are thinking: ‘we fight for this place, why can’t it take care of us?’,” she says.

One criticism is that, while Ms Shaffir has good ideas about how money should be spent — on free education and cheaper housing, for example — she has few proposals on how to generate the money to pay for it. She says that a bigger welfare state is possible because, “Israel is in a good financial position”, but dismisses the open market mechanisms that have helped make Israel competitive and wealthy.

Ms Shaffir is, however, focused on the welfare of the many and, with Israel ranked near the top of the OECD table for income inequality, the Jewish state has a clear need for her arguments.

The MK wants to restore faith in a political culture too often mired in corruption and nepotism, and she is a beacon for that process of renewal. Unusually for a politician, she has publicised her net worth (NIS 75,000) and, during the election, she encouraged young people to set up tents near polling stations in order to generate excitement around the electoral process.

Neither a typical MK nor a typical activist, Ms Shaffir seamlessly inhabits the two worlds — those of the establishment and the outsiders — that she is trying to bring them back together. She still shares with three friends the same Jaffa apartment (rent: NIS 1970) that she lived in before she got elected. How does she straddle the two aspects of her life? “There is only one world,” she says.

Chaos and low confidence afflict Foreign Ministry

Anshel Pfeffer — Thu, 21 Mar 2013 18:00:00 +0000

Only a couple of weeks ago, Israel’s diplomats were on cloud nine. After four years under Avigdor Lieberman, hardly the most desirable guest in most Western capitals, they believed that they were about to get the dream team — Yair Lapid as a new and presentable foreign minister, along with Tzipi Livni, unsuccessful in local politics but still the international media’s favourite Israeli statesman, as chief negotiator with the Palestinians. “Finally we will have someone to bring to Europe”, said one long-suffering envoy. But their hopes were dashed.

Mr Lieberman, who controls 11 of the Likud Beiteinu Knesset members, effectively holding Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s political fortunes in his hand, insisted that the Foreign Ministry be kept for him until his court case is over (if he is acquitted).

Mr Lapid was forced to accept the poisoned chalice of the finance ministry. Meanwhile, Mr Netanyahu will have little time to deal with the minutiae of Israel’s foreign relations. Various responsibilities such as the strategic relationship with the US, Israel’s ties with various international organisations and relations with the Jewish diaspora have been hived off to three other ministers, two with departments of their own to run and one, former Finance Minister Yuval Steinitz, who has received the new and yet to be defined title of Minister for International Relations.

If that wasn’t enough to erode the diplomats’ self-confidence, they have also received a new caretaker deputy minister to keep them in line. Zeev Elkin, the Likud whip in the last Knesset, may have started his political career as an MK of centrist Kadima but he is today on the far right of Likud. Mr Elkin, a resident of the settlement Kfar Eldad, was the author of the law limiting foreign funding for left-wing NGOs. He is resolutely against the establishment of a Palestinian state, has leaked information to hilltop settlers of imminent evictions and has stated that rebuilding the Temple in Jerusalem is a “national mission”.

Since none of those views will go down well in the capitals of Europe, it is hard to see Israeli embassies urging him to come over and show the flag.

Obama will speak to students - not Knesset

Anna Sheinman — Mon, 11 Mar 2013 15:17:17 +0000

On his visit to Israel, US President Barack Obama will speak to thousands of Israeli and Arab students rather than giving a speech to the Knesset, in order to reach out to the younger generation.

Although many Members of Knesset and the Prime Minister’s Office asked for the speech to be given in parliament, it will instead be delivered to 1,500 to 2,000 students in Jerusalem’s International Convention Centre.

Universities around the country have been given tickets which are to be allocated to students by ballot.

US Vice-President Joe Biden explained that Mr Obama was looking forward to speaking directly to the Israeli public, and particularly to its younger members.

The president will arrive in Israel on March 20. The timetable of his three-day visit was released on Monday; the itinerary includes Mount Herzl, Yad Vashem and an Iron Dome battery. He will meet Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as well as the leader of the Opposition and will travel to Ramallah to meet Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas.

Yishai tops Shas list, Deri comes second

Sandy Rashty — Thu, 06 Dec 2012 16:11:02 +0000

Shas, Israel’s religious Sephardi party, has announced its official list for the upcoming Knesset elections.

Interior Minister Eli Yishai was awarded top spot by the party’s Council of Torah Sages.

Aryeh Deri came second and Ariel Attias won third place.

In an interview with Ynet on Wednesday, Mr Deri denied that he was running for the top position.

“I came in order to serve the movement and to serve the public. I will accept whatever the Council of Torah Sages decides,” he said.

Israeli Labour party leader: we have ‘dream’ list for the election

Anna Sheinman — Fri, 30 Nov 2012 15:10:41 +0000

The Israeli Labour Party released its list of members running for the 19th Knesset on Friday morning following its party primary.

Labour leader Shelly Yacimovich expressed her delight at the outcome of the votes of 35,000 party members across Israel.

"We have an incredible list," said Ms Yacimovich in a speech to supporters. "In my best dreams, I could not have come up with a better list. It represents all factions of Israeli society."

Both new faces and old hands have been chosen as candidates. Former Welfare Minister Isaac Herzog came in second place behind Ms Yacimovich. In third place was former Defence Minister Amir Peretz, who has seen his profile boosted recently by the success of the Iron Dome anti-missile defence system.

New faces include social protest leaders Stav Shaffir and Itzik Shmuli, as well as defectors from Kadima and two senior military personnel.

A Likkud statement criticised the list as “extremist leftist”. The statement continued: “This is an extreme left list that enthusiastically supported the disengagement [from Gaza in 2005], who brought Hamas to power in Gaza, and that now may bring Gaza into Jerusalem and to the outskirts of Petah Tikva.”

On the Knesset menu: dead cat soup

Thu, 18 Oct 2012 19:30:00 +0100

The announcement of an early election in the past week by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu brings to an end the 18th Knesset, the longest serving parliament in the past two decades.

A report in Ma’ariv has revealed some of the more stomach-turning goings-on during the four-year session.

In September 2011, the carcass of a stray cat was found in one of the large soup pots in the cafeteria kitchen, which led to the kitchens being shut down temporarily.

The speaker of the Knesset called it “a serious incident”, while the caterer responded that “returning to work after a two-week break, our workers found the carcass. We were amazed that in one of the most secure sites in Israel, stray cats are allowed to wander unchecked around the site.”

A few years earlier, with a different catering company in place, an anonymous Shas member complained after finding a cockroach in his meal only a few days after pest controllers had visited the site.

Shas MK Yitzhak Vaknin recounted the incident: “I sat with this person who had a cockroach on his plate. He pointed it out to us. I saw the cockroach — it was no longer alive, it was cooked. This is very bad. There is a halachic issue here. This is an issue of insects, vermin, and unclean creatures. I called the kosher supervisors to come and see.”