Israeli Election 2009: Mayhem edges Chaos at the tape

To the victors go the spoils;
the losers, their pants are soiled.
--William Shakespearey

The results are back from Israel's 18th Knesset elections race. According to exit polls:

Mayhem is the surprise winner, having come from behind to defeat Chaos. In third place, Raging Hatred, while Absence of all Reason finished a distant fourth, just ahead of Medieval Tyranny. And at the back of the pack we have Blind Aggression, Wistfulness, the Party Formerly Known as the Communist Party, Oppressed One and Oppressed Two, and finally, Kill 'em All and Let G-d Sort 'em Out.

It will take some time for Mayhem to form a coalition government, and it will need an Absence of All Reason to function, along with some Medieval Tyranny. But look for Chaos to try to form its own majority bloc also with Medieval Tyranny and some Raging Hatred, and then Kill 'em All and Let G-d Sort 'em Out.

Okay here are the actual exit-poll results of the 2009 Israeli Knesset Elections, for which almost 65% of the country's 5,278,985 eligible voters case a ballot:

Kadima (Mayhem): 30 seats
Likud (Chaos): 28
Yisrael Beitenu (Raging Hatred): 15
Labor (Absence of All Reason): 13
Shas (Medieval Tyranny): 9
United Torah Judaism (Blind Aggression): 5
Meretz (Wistfulness): 5
Hadash (ex-Communists): 4
3 each or fewer to Rahm, Balad, Jewish Home and the National Union

The Knesset factory:

Churning out unruly coalition governments since 1948

MEET THE NEW PRIME MINISTER:
Tzipi (aka "Could be Worse") Livni, head of the Kadima party, will get first crack at forming a coalition government. She'll be Israel's second female Prime Minister. [Note: the first one, Golda Meir, was once described by David Ben-Gurion as "the best man in the Israeli government" -- so she may not count.]

BUD?
Sorry, the Marijuana Holocaust Survivors Party did not win enough votes for a seat in the Knesset. Maybe next time, dudes.

YOU SAID IT:
"Voting in Israel is, in fact, a lot like going to the dentist. For days before you mull it over, you worry. You deny, you hope for the best. There's a nagging ache that you hope will not turn out to be what you fear. You wonder whether it's worth doing this at all. The bottom line: While the best you can hope for may be no better than the way things are now, the worst may be catastrophic. In the end, then, what is the difference between voting in Israel and going to the dentist? [Avigdor] Lieberman."
-- Ha'aretz blogger Bradley Burston

MORE TO COME THIS SEASON:
Finally, don't despair, democracy watchers, for the end of the 2009 Middle East election series. More is on the way. Algeria has a presidential election on April 9. Yemen will hold Parliamentary elections on April 27. Iran votes in June. So does Lebanon. The Palestinians are due for a vote or two before the year is out.

[Update Feb 11: For final official ballot tallies, click here.]

Israel's Pro-Marijuana Holocaust Survivors Party

This item got lost at the bottom of Sunday's wordy Israeli Election Preview, but certainly deserves its own post:

For today's national elections, the Israeli Marijuana Party has joined forces with the Holocaust Survivor's Party to form the joint Pro-Marijuana Holocaust Survivors list. And here's their campaign spot:



And (all in Hebrew, but you don't need Hebrew to get it) another commercial plus an Israeli news story about the bizarre alliance:



Back with more on the Israeli election results after the polls close tonight.

Tuque Souq 2009 Israeli Election Preview

We don't want to fear-monger and tell you to pack your bags and head for the hills (of Jordan), but polls open in Israel in less than 48 hours and things ain't looking so good. While last-minute surveys hold that the Likud Party remains in the lead for the throne, it has become startlingly clear that the coveted princess of this election is not Benjamin Netanyahu but Avigdor Lieberman.

Lieberman (pictured) leads the far-right, secular-nationalist, pro-transfer party called Yisrael Beitenu ("Israel is our Home"). In recent weeks, his iron-fist rhetoric in post-war polling among voters has led many to conclude that the balance of power in the next Israeli government will be wielded by a racist who advocates the mass expulsion of Arabs from all of Israel.

Before we get to further analysis, here is a breakdown of the current standing of Knesset parties (blue indicates parties in the current coalition govt), and a poll prediction for Tuesday's vote.

Current Knesset:
Kadima 29 seats
Labor 19
Likud 12
Shas 12
Yisrael Beitenu 11
Nat'l Union/NRP 9
Pensioners 7
United Torah Judaism 6
Meretz-Yachad 5
United Arab List 4
Hadash 3
Balad 3

Latest Poll Prediction:
Likud 26 seats
Kadima 23
Yisrael Beitenu 19
Labor 17
Shas 10
Nat'l Union/NRP 6
Meretz-Yachad 6
United Torah Judaism 5
United Arab List 4
Hadash 4

(Notes: With 120 seats in the Knesset, a coalition needs 61 seats to govern. The party that finishes in first place gets first crack at forming a coalition, but if it fails then the runner-up finisher gets a crack. Parties must win at least 2% of the popular vote to qualify for a seat in the Knesset. The Pensioners Party is the latest here-today-gone-tomorrow Israeli party. They came from almost nowhere to nab 7 seats in 2006 and swing Ehud Olmert's Kadima-led coalition. Then the party split, and now it's all but gone.)

Naturally, the poll-leading Likud party is interested in having Lieberman's bloc join it in a coalition government. Things would then get sticky as the religious Shas Party probably wants nothing to do with anti-religion Yisrael Beitenu. So a hypothetical Likud-led government might have to include either Kadima or Labor to add up to a majority of 61.

Ehud Barak's inches-left-of-centre Labor Party is also pulling at Lieberman's sleeve. Kadima smells blood and hopes that enough right-wing fence voters will choose Lieberman over Likud so that Kadima ends up finishing in first place.

Then there's Shas, the Sephardi/Mizrahi ultra-orthodox party, which once upon a time held the fulcrum that Lieberman now wields. Used to be, Shas and its 12-or-15-odd seats would be enough to tip the balance of any coalition, and Shas was usually willing to join any government so long as it secured certain financial and moral guarantees from the government. (Shas is particularly fond of childcare subsidies, since the Haredim have such large families, and it opposes secular marriage ceremonies, which Lieberman staunchly supports.)

Recently, Shas's spiritual leader, the rabbi Ovadia Yosef, warned right-wing voters who sit on the fence between religious and secular that "a vote for Lieberman gives strength to Satan."

Lieberman, true to form, is basking in the glow of all this pre-election pomp. Despite his objectionable, physical ugliness, he's apparently quite popular among young, first-time voters in Israel. And despite his stomach-turning moral ugliness, he's already boasting that in the next Israeli election, his party will win over the most hearts and votes of Israelis.

So will Tuesday really be Avigdor Lieberman's bal débutante? Will Netanyahu get squeezed out between the far-right and the near-right? Will a fourth- or even fifth-place finish spell doom for Labor?

What if Likud and Yisrael Beitenu finish 1-2 but short of a combined majority? Would all the other parties (except presumably the also right-wing NU/NRP) unite to deny Netanyahu and Lieberman a chance at a possibly ruinous government?

Other election news/issues/tidbits culled from the final week of the campaign:

Further-right-than-Lieberman Baruch Marzel will be a poll-station monitor in the city of Umm al-Fahm, Israel's second-largest Arab city, which people like Lieberman and Marzel hope to force its residents to choose between loyalty to Israel and loyalty to Palestine (and expel the latter). This could get ugly.

The aforementioned Shas Party is showcasing its adaptability to the 20th century by promoting the political role of women in the ultra-orthodox community.

Could the Meretz Party, the white doves of the Israeli political flock, be shot down and stuffed for good? Ack, even Ha'aretz has turned on Meretz.

After the Israeli election commission reluctantly lifted its earlier ban on Arab parties participating in these elections, many in Israel's Arab communities are considering a boycott of the polls on Tuesday.

Oh, there are a whopping 33 political parties competing in Tuesday's election. That's a new record, even for a partying electorate like Israel's. The coolest party of the lot:

The Pro-Marijuana Holocaust Survivors Party!!

(This is not a joke. Click here to watch a Holocaust survivor encouraging you to toke up -- at least medicinally.)