Sometimes the votes that aren’t counted are the decisive ones. In 1992, the Tehiya party received 32,000 votes − close to the amount needed to enter the Knesset, but not quite enough. Had those votes been counted, Yitzhak Rabin wouldn’t have had the 61 Knesset seats he needed to keep the right from taking power. His government of the left, with outside support from the Arabs, would never have arisen. The Oslo Accords would never have been born. Rabin wouldn’t have been assassinated.
This year, the election is existential. Iran hasn’t disappeared. It remains the focus of Benjamin Netanyahu’s existence. The threat of a war conducted by a pariah government − key elements of which dream of a war for the Temple Mount − is hovering over Israel. Moreover, a substantial majority comprised of anti-democratic forces is liable to alter Israel permanently.
The election hasn’t yet been decided. The major blocs trend toward equality. The surveys showing that the gap in favor of the right has shrunk to three seats aren’t a fluke. One poll identified and influenced the trend: It showed voter turnout on the center-left is expected to rise, while turnout for Likud-Yisrael Beiteinu is falling.
It’s not by chance that the joint slate formed by Likud and Yisrael Beiteinu has plummeted to around 30 seats, and Likud alone to about 20. The social protest exerted an impact. The secular right isn’t interested in voting for the party they perceive as oppressing them. There’s no excitement about voting for Netanyahu. He’s returning to the days when, viewed as the oppressor of the people, he received only 12 seats.
It seems if the center-left had a leader who was even somewhat plausible − even former military chief Gabi Ashkenazi, despite the stain of the comptroller’s report on the Harpaz affair − Netanyahu would be defeated. The lack of desire to vote for him is enormous. But the votes must be counted.
In the last election, there were some 105,000 uncounted votes, of which 95,000 were from the center-left. They voted for the Green Party, the Pensioners Party, Green Leaf, Ephraim Sneh’s party and the Da’am Workers Party. Had they been counted, the right would have shrunk from 65 to 63 seats, and Netanyahu wouldn’t have had a 61-seat Knesset majority without the National Union party − nor a 61-seat anti-democratic majority that didn’t require the democratic quartet of Reuven Rivlin, Benny Begin, Dan Meridor and Michael Eitan. Thus the wave of anti-democratic legislation was borne aloft on the shoulders of those uncounted votes from the left.
Netanyahu has decided that missiles on Tel Aviv are preferable to nuclear weapons in Iran’s hands. The first part of that sentence is the important part. Netanyahu’s hatred for “Tel Aviv” is the cornerstone of his existence. Thus the fact that tens of thousands of “Tel Avivians” − even if they actually live elsewhere − are willing to have their votes against him go uncounted is inexplicable.
But it gets even worse. The Bader-Ofer Law states that surplus votes go to the largest parties. The surplus vote agreement signed between Likud-Yisrael Beiteinu and Naftali Bennett’s Habayit Hayehudi ensures that they will constitute the largest bloc of parties, and will thus get two to three seats from the surplus votes. The fact that tens of thousands of leftist Tel Avivians are willing to go uncounted, and thus to give their votes to Netanyahu-Bennett, is tantamount to committing suicide.
Such an act is doubly inexplicable. First, on the existential level: These uncounted voters will be voting for the missiles that are slated to fall on their heads and do irreversible damage to Tel Aviv. Second, on the moral level: Of all places, Tel Aviv, the bastion of liberal democratic life, will, by not being counted, vote for religious, racist, anti-democratic and anti-liberal fascism. Tel Avivians will put fascism into power.
Eight parties are fighting to cross the electoral threshold, which is set at about 75,000 votes. They are Balad, which will presumably cross; Otzma Le’yisrael and Kadima, which could go either way; and Am Shalem, Koah Le’hashpia, Green Leaf, Eretz Hadasha and Ha’yisraelim, which surveys show are far from crossing the threshold. The fact that this time − for the first time since Tehiya − there’s a significant number of votes from the right that might also go uncounted creates a chance for the right to lose its majority. The fact that on the other side, some 200,000 Israelis from the center-left are liable, through not being counted, to destroy their own lives and those of their friends, is scandalous.
The head of one of the above parties promised that if it isn’t certain to win the requisite 75,000 votes, it will withdraw from the race so as not to hand power to Netanyahu. It was always clear that this was mere spin. But the choice is in the voters’ hands.
Nothing has yet been decided. A plethora of options that will be counted await the center-left voter, from Hatnuah in the center to Hadash and Meretz on the left. The chances that a large public will enable the last of these to once again be a sizable party standing tall against fascism is a gladdening possibility.
So go and vote. And make sure your vote will be counted.
Front Page Features