Coalition Predictions Scorecard - and more

In a previous posting, Post-Election Game Theory, I laid out my predictions for how the coalition would look.  With the new government finally having been sworn in, after way more haggling than anyone expected, let's go back now and see how I did, only mentioning areas where I specifically went out on a limb.

1. Tachlis: I predicted a government composed of Likud, Yesh Atid, Bayit Yehudi and Kadima.  I was out by one: the Tzipi Livni Movement instead of Kadima.  (Or is that in addition to Kadima?  Nobody in the media seems to know - or care - whether Kadima is in or out of the coalition.  Me neither.)  
2. Labor: despite Netanyahu's sincere efforts to woo Yecimovich into the coalition, she stuck by her guns, as I predicted.
3. Bayit Yehudi: despite some very bad blood between them (apparently worse than I thought originally), Bibi finally had to bring Bennett into the government.  He really didn't want to, but like I said, the numbers just didn't work otherwise.
4. Shas: could conceivably have overcome their incompatibility issues with Yesh Atid by looking for compromises, but instead chose to dig in to their trenches, and now find themselves with no say in how the "sharing the burden" debate plays out.  Merubeh tafasta, lo tafasta - try get too much, and you end up with nothing.  I wish I had been wrong about that prediction, but I wasn't.
5. UTJ, while less strident in their rhetoric than Shas, also chose the route of conflict.  Pity, but also a clear call.
6. Tzippi Livni: this is the only one that completely blindsided me.  I was totally gobsmacked when Netanyahu cut the first deal with Livni, especially with her as lead negotiator with the Palestinians.  I think he thinks putting her into that position is going to teach her some stark lessons in reality, as in "Good luck with that!" - but frankly I'm quite afraid that she will be able to do Israel a lot of damage from that position. But given that she was included, it makes Kadima's piddly 2 mandates completely inconsequential, and therefore wasteful to include them in the coalition.

So it wasn't a 100% score, but still not too bad.  And from that position, I'm going to make a few more predictions.

1. Tzippi Livni won't last long in the government.  She can't.  Her pet issue is making a peace agreement with the Palestinians, and she will be unable to do so, for any number of reasons.  Either the Palestinians will continue to refuse flat-out to return to negotiations and continue on the unilateral track, or they will only come back to that table on condition that Israel in principle agrees to roll over and die as a precondition for restarting talks.  Livni will probably accept any preconditions they want, but she will be overruled by the rest of the coalition - or at least, I hope so.  Furthermore, with Bayit Yehudi controlling the Construction Ministry, and Moshe Yaalon as Minister of Defense, sooner or later Livni is going to proclaim that peace is just not achievable while we continue to "provoke" the Palestinians by allowing the residents of Efrat to enclose their verandas and instructing the army to actually defend themselves against Molotov cocktails rather than running away, and she will resign in a huff, doing as much damage as possible in the international arena on her way out, and try her hand (again) at Opposition politics.  I don't think we'll have to wait a year for that to happen, maybe as little as six months.  
2. The burden will be shared, and it will be done intelligently and fairly.  (Now that's going out on a limb!)  Shas and UTJ are spoiling for a fight; they will threaten that all the Haredim will go to jail rather than serve in the army; and they will be disappointed.  There will be no imprisonments, no arrests, not even skirmishes.  The government will simply enact a set of financial rules that will give attractive economic benefits to people who complete the army or other national service, not much for people who are officially exempted (e.g. new immigrants), and an extra tax on people who refuse to serve.  The Haredim will not be given the option of being public heroes and dramatically going to jail; instead they will have the much harder choice between doing national service and getting the concomitant economic benefits, or refusing and quietly going the long haul with an onerous tax burden.  Faced with this dilemma, I believe the rank and file will vote with their feet, and despite the pashkevillin that will be plastered over every vertical surface in Mea Shearim and Bnei Brak, screaming about how this is a milchemes mitzva and a chillul Hashem to do any kind of national service, a very large number of Haredim will go along with the new system.  It will certainly beat the indentured poverty into which the old system forces them.
3. The government can fall in one of two ways: either Yesh Atid falls off the Left flank, or Bayit Yehudi falls off the Right.  The only way I can think of that Yair Lapid will be sufficiently outraged as to walk out of the government would be if the government fails to implement a "sharing the burden" plan.  If he ever does quit the government, it won't hurt Bibi, because the Haredi parties will be lined up to take his place - and that might result in the undoing of said plan.  Lapid is in this coalition for the long haul, and his negotiating power is weak, because 19 mandates notwithstanding, he is replaceable.
4. Bennett, on the other hand, is less constrained by such considerations, because he truly is irreplaceable   If Bibi ventures too far Left, Bennett can threaten to bring down the government.  The Haredim will not replace them in a coalition with Lapid.  And around 75% of the Likud MKs themselves will agree with Bennett.  Unlike the 2005 Disengagement government, the vast majority of the Likud MKs are now strong ideologues who will themselves vote no-confidence in the government if Bibi tries to do a Sharon on us.  Even if Bibi tries to get Labor involved, it just can't work out.  Result: no more insane concessions to the Palestinians, and Tzippi Livni will quit the coalition (see above).  So Bennett really is sitting pretty.
5. As a result of the above considerations, absent any "black swan" events, I'm calling that this coalition will see out its full term of office.  That will be a first!

All told, I'm pretty optimistic about this government.  The common thread between the major coalition parties is that they're security wise, free market supporters with a non-coercive approach.  I think on the whole things are looking up for Israel.

Your thoughts?

Post-election game theory

The day after elections is always the most fun.  That's when all the amateur pundits get to speculate about who will make up the next coalition.  I did that after the 2009 elections, and if I may say so myself, I thought I did pretty well.  Here's a list of the things I called right:

1. About Labor: "Ehud Barak has stated that he's expecting to be in the opposition, but I don't think he'd say no to any opportunity to be part of anyone's coalition... if he could hang on to a ministry - any ministry - by signing up for a Likud coalition, I don't think Netanyahu's diplomatic or economic agenda would faze him much. He might have more of a problem convincing his fellow MKs to come along for the ride..."  And so it was.  Barak surprised everyone else by leading Labor into a coalition with Likud, but halfway through the term, Labor split in half.
2. About Kadima: "Kadima is not equipped to be an opposition party, and my prediction is that if they are not at least part of this government, they will be destroyed in the next election by the comeback of the more ideologically motivated Labor and Meretz."  OK, according to the provisional results, they hung on to existence by their fingernails, with 2 seats.  And the votes from the army might yet push them off the edge.  But still... pretty much spot on.
3. Livni would lose out in the coalition negotiations game to Netanyahu, mostly owing to her having burned her bridges with Shas.

So, having established my credentials from past performance, I now present my analysis of the first 2013 Knesset elections.  (It's entirely possible we may be back at the polls later this year!)

Starting with the facts of seat allocations:

• Likud-Beiteinu: 31
• Yesh Atid: 19
• Labor: 15
• Bayit Yehudi (BY): 11
• Shas: 11
• UTJ: 7
• Meretz: 6
• Livni: 6
• Kadima: 2
• Arabs: 12

Everyone in the mainstream media (MSM) makes a big hoo-ha about the Left and Right blocs being evenly balanced at 60 each.  Utter nonsense, from 2 perspectives:

1. The Arab parties are not part of any bloc, inasmuch as they cannot be included in any coalition.  Even the Lefties might briefly flirt with the idea of surprising everyone and making the first ever coalition that includes the Arab parties, but they'll drop that idea as soon as they consider what will happen the first time Israel has to respond to a security threat.  If the Arab parties focused more on issues concerning the civil rights of Israeli Arabs and less on furthering the goal of destroying Israel as a Jewish state, there might have been something to talk about...
2. Shas and UTJ are not part of any bloc, either.  Economically speaking, they are much closer to Labor than Likud.  The only issue they have with the Left is the anti-religious slant of most Leftist parties.  Shelly Yecimovich, however, has been mostly conciliatory, and I thought her explicit refusal to demonize Haredim was a very dignified stand.  Theoretically, she could form an alliance with them.

So I'm not going to analyze these results in terms of "blocs", but rather interests.  Let's see where that leads us.

• Likud: This was the second consecutive electoral humiliation for Netanyahu.  In both 2009 and 2013 he started the campaign with the wind at his tail, and twice now he has led the Likud into a situation where they have won by an embarrassingly narrow margin.  He needs a very stable coalition now, because if his government collapses mid-term, the knives will be out for him in the Likud.  Moshe Feiglin is a MK now.  If Feiglin could take 33% of the Likud primary vote (before blatant cheating in the official vote count took it down to 24%) without even being a MK, Netanyahu knows he will be facing a very serious challenge next time around.  For this reason, he may be prepared to offer much more than he would otherwise have wanted to to other parties in order to get a big coalition.
• Yesh Atid: Another one-hit-wonder party takes the political scene by storm.  I give Yair Lapid a lot more credit than most other right-wing commentators; I don't think he's as rabidly anti-Haredi as his late father, and I actually do believe he has some ideals.  He's a pragmatist, not a Lefty, not a Righty, which I think makes him an obvious coalition partner for Netanyahu.  He's done the math, and knows that the Left can't form a government without Likud, and he wants to make a difference in government, so he will want to cut a deal with Bibi.  But he has some compatibility issues in the coalition.  His flagship issue was equality in bearing the burden of civic responsibility.  That puts him at direct odds with Shas and UTJ.  He has more seats than Shas and UTJ put together, so he's in a position to make serious demands.  If he's in government, it is very unlikely Shas or UTJ will be.
• Labor: Silly, silly Shelly painted herself into a corner by publicly insisting she would not join a Likud-led government.  She'll have major egg on her face if she backtracks now.  Being that she is otherwise a very sincere person who means what she says, she will be the Leader of the Opposition.
• Bayit Yehudi: Will unquestionably be in the coalition.  The math doesn't work otherwise.  With 31 Likud + 19 Yesh Atid + 11 BY, there's your majority of 61.  But too close for comfort.  And any one party could bring down the government.  Bibi needs more partners than that.
• Shas: As mentioned before, there's an incompatibility issue with Yesh Atid.  Frankly, Likud is closer to Yesh Atid, ideologically speaking, than to Shas.  The only way they will be able to get into government is by making compromises on things like army service and separation of synagogue and state.  The nature of Shas is to fight rather than compromise, so I reckon it's the opposition for them.
• UTJ: They're generally more moderate than Shas, but still, I find it hard to envision how they will be able to compromise on their core issues of keeping Haredim out of the army and the workforce.  Plus, they usually go hand in hand with Shas, so I also call them in the opposition.
• Tzipi Livni: The most delusionally egoistic politician in the country, she won't join Bibi's coalition without a huge price tag, like being named Deputy Prime Minister or something like that.  Even her piffling 6 seats won't tame her demands.  There will be talks, but they won't get anywhere.  Bibi wants more support from somewhere to shore up his government, but the cost of having her on board will be too much to tolerate.  She won't last long in the opposition, either - before the next elections she will huffily resign from the Knesset and go back into political retirement... before her next grand announcement of yet another comeback... yaaawn....
• Meretz: Too far left to consider.  Next, please.
• Kadima: At this writing, Shaul Mofaz is still not breathing any sighs of relief, because the votes from the army could yet push him back below the entry threshold for the Knesset.  But assuming he gets in, he knows his only chance of political survival will be to get some position of prominence in the coalition.  His price will be very cheap, and Bibi will take him.  Plus, he has the added benefit of being a "Center Left" party... and Lapid promised he wouldn't join the coalition without another "Center Left" party.  Houston, we have synergy.

So my final prediction is that the coalition will be Likud, Yesh Atid, Bayit Yehudi and Kadima.  Bibi may make overtures to a few others, and it's not out of the bounds of possibility that another party or two will be enticed to join, but unlikely.

Bets, please!

Pre-election analysis for rational voters

Looks like everyone else around town is blogging their thoughts on how to vote this Tuesday, so I don't see why I shouldn't either.  Hopefully this logical decision tree will help you make up your mind too!

Let's start with the big questions.  In most other democracies in the world, the barometer is, as Bill Clinton put it, "It's the economy, stupid."  In Israel, where we face permanent existential threats, this changes to: "It's the security, stupid."  Left and Right in Israel are more about your approach to Israel's geopolitical situation.  Thus the moribund Kadima, which ran very much a capitalist, free-market economy under Ehud Olmert's tenure, is considered "Left", because of its "dovish" views on security, while Shas is considered "Right", despite its practically socialist economic platform.  Or at least, it was considered Right under Eli Yishai... things look a little different now that Aryeh Deri has successfully staged his coup...

So decision 1 in the tree is this: do you believe that Israel needs to make more concessions to the Palestinians in order to make peace?  If your answer is yes, your choice is between Labor, Yesh Atid, Kadima, Tzippi Livni's Movement (aptly named), and Meretz.  I won't dwell too much here because frankly they all make me ill.  I have some grudging respect for Shelly Yecimovich as a worthy adversary, and Meretz just because they actually do have an ideology.  If you're on this side of the political fence, here's where we part ways; I won't presume to advise you anything other than that you please should vote on Wednesday.

So if, like me, you're of the opinion that the Arabs will never agree to any peace deal with Israel that deprives them of the "right" to continue attempting to destroy Israel outright, you're left with several options: Likud-Beiteinu, Bayit Yehudi (Jewish Home), Shas, UTJ (Gimmel) and Otzma L'Yisrael (Strong Israel).

Now some haredi readers might have tagged along till now, thinking, "There are more important things than security - like Torah.  It doesn't matter what security platform anyone has; the most important thing is that they are frumme Yidden who will make sure that the Torah world is well looked after."  I think the "Daas Torah" argument was very adeptly handled by Rav Slifkin - he put it much better than I ever could.  I will simply add that I have never forgiven UTJ for selling out the Jews of Gush Katif and voting for Sharon's 2005 Disengagement budget in exchange for a 290 million shekel bribe.  And it's not for me to forgive.  When they ask for (and receive) forgiveness from those 10,000 Jews for the trauma and suffering they callously caused them, then they can try and convince me that they're the party that represents Torah.  Till then, don't even talk to me.

Shas?  If you had to poll secular Israelis for which political party turns them off Judaism the most, I reckon Shas would coast home, even before UTJ rounded the final bend.  Aside from their socialist economics and the new Leftist inclination under new management - for crying out loud, they have a convicted embezzler at the top, who still shamelessly claims he's the victim of a Sephardophobic conspiracy!  You believe the conspiracy theories?  Then Shas is for you.

Now we're down to the wire.  3 parties left, all very security minded, all opposed to making stupid concessions to the Arabs that will only further undermine our position.  But wait?  Didn't Netanyahu, in his last term, do exactly that?  Building freezes, outpost evacuations, internationally declared support for the "two state solution"?

My gut wants to punish Netanyahu, and vote for one of the other two right-wing parties.  But let's take a step back and consider the implications.

I love Aryeh Eldad and Michael Ben-Ari, just for the fact that they are so proud of their ideological stand.  You won't find them zigzagging about conscientious objection or our rights to all of Eretz Yisrael.  They are colorful and entertaining - but they are totally irrelevant to the overall political process.  Even if they got 10 seats in the Knesset they would be irrelevant, in the same way as the 11-12 Arab MKs are also irrelevant.  They will never be included in any coalition, and will never have any effect on government policy.  All they can do is make a noise from the sidelines.  Not that that noise is without value; it's good to have a fiery opposition, if just to raise public consciousness.  But you can get better bang for your buck as far as voting is concerned.

Naftali Bennett and Bayit Yehudi are really the phenomenon of the election.  From a combined 5 seats in the outgoing Knesset (BY plus half the National Union), they are looking at somewhere between double and triple that in the coming election.  I have tremendous respect for them, they have a strong, high-quality list of candidates (special mention for Jeremy Gimpel), and they are very likely to form part of the new coalition, which means they can influence government policy.  Or can they?

Well, not really, when it comes down to the wire.  If you recall, before the Disengagement, Sharon had a coalition including Mafdal (BY's predecessor).  When Mafdal voted against Disengagement, Sharon simply fired them and re-formed his coalition with the Left.

The fact is, BY may be part of the coalition, but they will always be dispensable if they ever get too uppity.  So Netanyahu will throw them a few bones to keep them happy, but they do not have critical leverage.

Now let's look again at the Likud-Beiteinu list.  Back in 2005, when the Likud split over the Disengagement, there was only a handful of Likud MKs who stood strong and voted against the Disengagement the whole way.  Today, things look very different.  In the top 21 of the Likud list, only 3 candidates have declared support for the two-state solution - Netanyahu himself, Hanegbi and Shama-Hacohen.  The rest of the list is filled with people of the calibre of Feiglin, Danon, Hotovely, Levin, Elkin, etc.  Aside from them, Saar, Erdan, Chaim Katz and Gamliel were all among the "Likud rebels" who voted against disengagement.  Also, very significantly for those of us in Beit Shemesh, Keti Sheetrit is in the long-shot position 38.  It would be really good for our city to get our first ever MK.  The Yisrael Beiteinu part is also very ideologically strong, including people like Yair Shamir and Uzi Landau.  The Likud of today cannot do another disengagement - because the prime minister would literally be left on his own.  Bayit Yehudi is dispensible, but the Likud is not.  The prime minister has to caucus with these people every week, and he cannot do anything without having his own team on board.

And it's not even the case that a vote for Likud is equivalent to a vote for Bayit Yehudi.  The smaller the Likud is, the less stable the coalition will be, and the more likely Netanyahu will have to rely on the Left to build his coalition.  Let's take a hypothetical best-case scenario where Likud-Beiteinu gets 61 seats by itself, and doesn't need any other party to join the coalition.  In such a case, there would be no need to buy off smaller, sectoral-interest parties, no ministers-without-portfolio, no need for pork mutton-barrel politics.  Imagine that!  You could have a government that is focused only on things that matter, rather than having to keep soothing the egos and budget needs of disgruntled nochschleppers.

The opposite scenario is too horrible for words.  Imagine Likud with 30 seats, BY with 15, Labor with 19, Yesh Atid with 12, Shas with 11, UTJ with 6, Livni with anything.  Now Likud has to pull in at least two other parties just to break 61.  In order to neutralize the threat of any one party being able to bring down the coalition, you would need 61 plus the number of seats of the next biggest coalition partner.  We'll need so many joke ministries it's frightening: a "Minister for Administrative Affairs", a "Deputy Minister in the Prime Minister's Office" and 3 Ministers Without Portfolio.  Every one of these coalition partners is going to be constantly whining about the amount of budget they get allocated to their pet cause, and since no two of them will be able to agree on anything of significance, it'll be another 4 years of being stuck in the same rut.  Sound familiar?  Yes, that's exactly the scenario we have today.

When you vote for a splinter party, you are voting for bloated government, inefficiency and corruption.

So I'm voting Likud.  They have governed this country excellently for the last four years, and they will do even better, the more they are free of the whines and demands of coalition partners.  The Likud has a party list I'm proud of, and I think they are the best people on offer to be running the government on Israel.

I hope you will do the same!

Refusing Orders - Left, Right & Wrong

This latest tempest in a teacup about Naftali Bennett supposedly advocating refusal of orders has been badly played by everyone, in my opinion.  Netanyahu, by pouncing on him the way he has, has given the impression that he is, indeed, planning Disengagement II - although I don't personally believe that to be true; rather I think he's just trying to win back some of the swing votes that Bayit Yehudi has been steadily pulling from Likud.  And Bennett himself, by climbing down do hurriedly, left himself looking wishy washy.

Personally I think Bennett could have made a stronger and more principled stand by clarifying a nuance that seems to have been overlooked by pretty much everyone.

There are two types of refusal of orders.  One is where you are second-guessing your superiors, because you think you know better than them.  If your commander screams, "Acharai!" - then you better darn well be there behind him, even if you think it's a foolish move.  Refusing orders under such circumstances is indeed dangerous and damaging to the entire structure of the army.

The other kind is where you are given an order that you believe is immoral.  For example, let's say a commander orders a soldier to drive his fellow soldiers to the beach for a party on Shabbat.  Under such circumstances, the soldier is obligated to say, "I'm sorry, Sir, but I take my orders from the King of Kings, and I cannot do that."  The penalty could be a court-martial, imprisonment, or any amount of money, and the soldier is obligated to refuse orders.

In practical terms, going back to 2005, if a soldier decided to refuse orders because he believed the Disengagement was a foolish mistake and tactically wrong, that it would bring rockets on the whole of Southern Israel and make Israel's geopolitical situation infinitely worse, he would have been wrong to do so.  A soldier's business is not to reason why, but to carry out his orders.

On the other hand, if a soldier saw the Disengagement as immoral and evil, because of (among other things) the injustice it was doing to the families of Gush Katif, then he would have been obligated to refuse to participate in any way, even by taking over the duties of another soldier stationed on the Lebanese border, so that that soldier could go and rip Jews from their homes (מסייע לדבר עבירה).

I believe this is the moral duty of any soldier, anywhere, to be true to his morals - and be ready to pay the price.  This is true also for a leftist who believes it is immoral to serve in Judea & Samaria.  He should refuse orders, and be prepared to be court-martialed and imprisoned for his beliefs.  And if he is not prepared to stand tall, openly refuse orders and take the punishment, that's a good sign that his refusal is not based on moral considerations.

Suppression of the soldier's individual conscience and morality is a very dangerous and evil thing to advocate.  The logical extreme of this attitude is summed up in the infamous excuse:

"Ve vos chust following orders!"