Israel: Netanyahu wins Israel election

you wont like this sassy,     Netanyahu   has won the election.

To be honest Nicko I was hoping the the others would win as I do not believe this is progressivelly good for Israel. You know I will stand against any hate promoted against Israel but he is not winning many fans with his stance.

nicko wrote:you wont like this sassy,     Netanyahu   has won the election.

But he showed his hand Nicko, and he can't lie anymore:

JERUSALEM — Benjamin Netanyahu was poised to return to power. But there was a cloud over his apparent turnaround, the result of an increasingly shrill campaign that raised questions about his ability to heal Israel’s internal wounds or better its standing in the world.

He said there would be no Palestinian state under his watch.

He railed against Israeli Arabs — because they had gone out to vote.

From the capitals of Europe, to Washington, to the West Bank, to the streets of Israel, even while his critics said Mr. Netanyahu had reaffirmed his reputation as a cynical, calculating politician, it appeared that his approach succeeded in drawing votes from other right-leaning parties.

But along the way he angered the president of the United States with a speech to Congress and infuriated European leaders eager to see the peace process move ahead to create a Palestinian state.

David Axelrod, President Obama’s former senior adviser, said Tuesday evening on Twitter that Mr. Netanyahu’s last-minute stand against a Palestinian state might have helped ensure him another victory. “Tightness of exits in Israel suggests Bibi’s shameful 11th-hour demagoguery may have swayed enough votes to save him. But at what cost?” he wrote.

JERUSALEM — Benjamin Netanyahu was poised to return to power. But there was a cloud over his apparent turnaround, the result of an increasingly shrill campaign that raised questions about his ability to heal Israel’s internal wounds or better its standing in the world.

He said there would be no Palestinian state under his watch.

He railed against Israeli Arabs — because they had gone out to vote.

From the capitals of Europe, to Washington, to the West Bank, to the streets of Israel, even while his critics said Mr. Netanyahu had reaffirmed his reputation as a cynical, calculating politician, it appeared that his approach succeeded in drawing votes from other right-leaning parties.

But along the way he angered the president of the United States with a speech to Congress and infuriated European leaders eager to see the peace process move ahead to create a Palestinian state.

David Axelrod, President Obama’s former senior adviser, said Tuesday evening on Twitter that Mr. Netanyahu’s last-minute stand against a Palestinian state might have helped ensure him another victory. “Tightness of exits in Israel suggests Bibi’s shameful 11th-hour demagoguery may have swayed enough votes to save him. But at what cost?” he wrote.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel posted a video to social media on Tuesday urging Israelis to vote. He said right wing rule was threatened by Arab voters.

Still, Mr. Netanyahu has a long history in power and has in the past demonstrated that he can change positions from campaigning to governing. His record is as a pragmatist, analysts said.

“I am sure that Netanyahu, with his broad historical perspective, if he is prime minister again, will be thinking long and hard about what legacy he will want to leave behind with regard to the demographic makeup of the country and its standing in the world,” said Gidi Grinstein, founder of the Reut Institute, an Israeli strategy group. “In the end I would not rule out his going back to the two-state solution,” he said, referring to the establishment of a Palestinian state alongside Israel.

Tzachi Hanegbi, a Likud deputy foreign minister in the departing government, told reporters on Tuesday night that he expected the American administration to make an effort to renew the Israeli-Palestinian negotiations. “We would be very delighted to renew the negotiations,” Mr. Hanegbi said, adding that it was up to the Palestinians. “It is to the benefit of both peoples,” he said.

The campaign for the Parliament was divisive, exposing the fault lines in Israeli society, between the religious and the secular, the left and the right. It exposed a fatigue with a man who is seeking to serve a fourth term as prime minister, and a fear over Israel’s place in the international community. Much was driven by the tenor of the campaigns, which became personal and bitter.

None more so than Mr. Netanyahu’s campaign.

Many Israelis called it the “gevalt campaign,” using a Yiddish expression for alarm. In the final days of a closely fought election race, Mr. Netanyahu threw all political and diplomatic niceties to the wind.

He said that if his Likud Party won Tuesday’s national elections, he would never allow the creation of a Palestinian state, a reversal of a stance he had taken six years earlier. That risked further damaging his already frayed relations with the Obama administration after a confrontation over Iran and increasing European frustration with Israel.

Mr. Netanyahu’s conflict with the White House became a campaign issue, with critics saying that it alone undermined Israel’s security. Washington is Israel’s most important ally, providing crucial financial and diplomatic support.

In interviews with the Israeli news media that Mr. Netanyahu usually shuns, he complained of a conspiracy of left-wing organizations funded from abroad and foreign governments out to topple him.

And in a seemingly desperate bid to rally support halfway through the balloting, he went on a tirade against Israel’s Arab citizens.
He said there would be no Palestinian state under his watch.

He railed against Israeli Arabs — because they had gone out to vote.

From the capitals of Europe, to Washington, to the West Bank, to the streets of Israel, even while his critics said Mr. Netanyahu had reaffirmed his reputation as a cynical, calculating politician, it appeared that his approach succeeded in drawing votes from other right-leaning parties.

But along the way he angered the president of the United States with a speech to Congress and infuriated European leaders eager to see the peace process move ahead to create a Palestinian state.
David Axelrod, President Obama’s former senior adviser, said Tuesday evening on Twitter that Mr. Netanyahu’s last-minute stand against a Palestinian state might have helped ensure him another victory. “Tightness of exits in Israel suggests Bibi’s shameful 11th-hour demagoguery may have swayed enough votes to save him. But at what cost?” he wrote.

Still, Mr. Netanyahu has a long history in power and has in the past demonstrated that he can change positions from campaigning to governing. His record is as a pragmatist, analysts said.

“I am sure that Netanyahu, with his broad historical perspective, if he is prime minister again, will be thinking long and hard about what legacy he will want to leave behind with regard to the demographic makeup of the country and its standing in the world,” said Gidi Grinstein, founder of the Reut Institute, an Israeli strategy group. “In the end I would not rule out his going back to the two-state solution,” he said, referring to the establishment of a Palestinian state alongside Israel.

Tzachi Hanegbi, a Likud deputy foreign minister in the departing government, told reporters on Tuesday night that he expected the American administration to make an effort to renew the Israeli-Palestinian negotiations. “We would be very delighted to renew the negotiations,” Mr. Hanegbi said, adding that it was up to the Palestinians. “It is to the benefit of both peoples,” he said.

The campaign for the Parliament was divisive, exposing the fault lines in Israeli society, between the religious and the secular, the left and the right. It exposed a fatigue with a man who is seeking to serve a fourth term as prime minister, and a fear over Israel’s place in the international community. Much was driven by the tenor of the campaigns, which became personal and bitter.

None more so than Mr. Netanyahu’s campaign.

Many Israelis called it the “gevalt campaign,” using a Yiddish expression for alarm. In the final days of a closely fought election race, Mr. Netanyahu threw all political and diplomatic niceties to the wind.

He said that if his Likud Party won Tuesday’s national elections, he would never allow the creation of a Palestinian state, a reversal of a stance he had taken six years earlier. That risked further damaging his already frayed relations with the Obama administration after a confrontation over Iran and increasing European frustration with Israel.

Mr. Netanyahu’s conflict with the White House became a campaign issue, with critics saying that it alone undermined Israel’s security. Washington is Israel’s most important ally, providing crucial financial and diplomatic support.

In interviews with the Israeli news media that Mr. Netanyahu usually shuns, he complained of a conspiracy of left-wing organizations funded from abroad and foreign governments out to topple him.

And in a seemingly desperate bid to rally support halfway through the balloting, he went on a tirade against Israel’s Arab citizens.

“Right-wing rule is in danger,” he said. “Arab voters are streaming in huge quantities to the polling stations.”

He said they were being bused to polling stations in droves by left-wing organizations in an effort that “distorts the true will of the Israelis in favor of the left, and grants excessive power to the radical Arab list,” referring to the new alliance of Arab parties. Opponents accused him of baldfaced racism.

“More than a gevalt campaign it was a ‘Let’s blow up the world’ campaign,” said Gadi Wolfsfeld, a professor of political communications at the Interdisciplinary Center in Herzliya, Israel. “It was a scorched-earth policy to stay in power.”

In Washington, lawmakers who were angered by Mr. Netanyahu’s speech to Congress said they would be disappointed if voters in Israel rewarded the prime minister with another term in office.

“There were a number of us who wanted to see whether his gambit to criticize the president, in breach of all diplomatic protocol, will be rewarded in Israel,” said Representative Gerald E. Connolly, Democrat of Virginia.

Mr. Connolly, a member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, is a relatively junior member of Congress, and Mr. Netanyahu retained support within Congress, especially in the Republican majority. But Mr. Connolly’s views echoed those of many Democratic lawmakers who have expressed dismay about what they said were Mr. Netanyahu’s efforts to ally himself with Republicans in America.

“As far as I’m concerned, Netanyahu burned his bridges with the American government and a broad swath of the American people,” Mr. Connolly said. “It is to me, frankly, a really sordid approach to diplomacy and friendship and alliance. I hope that behavior is not rewarded today.”

Martin S. Indyk, a former special envoy for Middle East peace in the Obama administration who is now vice president of the Brookings Institution, said that while it was still unclear what kind of government might arise in Israel, the tenor of Mr. Netanyahu’s relationship with the Obama administration was likely to be governed by a confrontation over Iran in the short term, should a nuclear deal be reached. In the longer term, Mr. Indyk said, a right-wing government led by Mr. Netanyahu was likely to be in confrontation with the international community over the Palestinian issue.

But Shmuel Sandler, a professor of political science at Bar-Ilan University near Tel Aviv, said Mr. Netanyahu had been fighting for his political survival. “Yesterday he was prepared to do anything,” he said. But he added that Mr. Netanyahu knew he now had to repair his relationship with Mr. Obama.

At the headquarters of the Joint List of Arab parties in Nazareth, in northern Israel, people hooted and cheered as the election results came in.

“This is a great achievement,” hollered Ahmad Tibi, a veteran Arab politician, referring to indications that the list had won about a dozen seats in the 120-seat Parliament. “But we will have before us great challenges,” he added. “We will fight racism, we will fight fascism, we will defend our rights, regardless of the government. We are the indigenous people of this land and we look to the future with the optimism and realism,” he said. “Today we are stronger.”

By the night’s end, Mr. Netanyahu seemed to realize he needed to recalibrate his message. In a late-night speech claiming victory, he spoke of delivering security and social welfare to “all citizens of Israel, Jews and non-Jews alike.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/18/world/middleeast/netanyahu-israel-elections-arabs.html


He will loathe the fact that he tried to completely disenfranchise Palestinian Israelis and that made them work together instead of being spit into 3 parties.

He's done himself no favours, because the country he relies on, America, now completely distrusts him and knows he has been working against the peace process all along.

Just like hamas and Fatah have been constantly working against the peace process all along.
How many times has peace been offered to them for them to only reject peace and why?
Because they will only be happy when Israel ceases to exist.
So stop making the most lame biased argument ever when both sides  do wrong.

AND another five years of guaranteed hell for Israel..

IF EVER a country had an apparent and inherent 'death wish' ~ both sides as mad as the other.

He won't hang on that long. This is a tenuous one.

So he won and I have to say I am relieved. There wll be no more endless cycles of pointless ‘negotiations’ with Israel pretending that some day it will agree to a two-state solution while continually escalating both settlement (colony) building and the maltreament of the Palestinians. Now everyone will see that the Palestinians were right all along and that Israel has never been a partner for negotiations.

There is no real political Left in Israel and if the other side got to form a government, all we would have seen is more of the same. Now we’ll see if the EU has the decency and conviction to enact proper sanctions. Then of course there is the US. The US Administration might stall for a while, but we’ll see if they have what it takes to do the right thing. Israel is no friend to the US and the sooner they realise it the better.

Israel is on a slippery slope of its own making. Get your popcorn, sit and watch. Israel is becoming more radicalised than ever before. Certainly much more than when I was growing up there. Of course I could be wrong — and I hope I am — but I think Israel’s pathological siege mentality will now become more pronounced and more evident to outsiders. Israel has for a long time been readying itself for when the time comes, to bunker down, live with austerity and give up the fancy lifestyle the country has become increasingly accustomed to in the last 20-25 years. They can do this.

Israel has always prepared itself psychologically and economically to being isolated. All that openness to the rest of the world that Israel has enjoyed increasingly in the last generation or so, and Israel’s acceptance by others, have always been seen as temporary in the eyes of most Israeli Jews. They had always expected it to end and had the mentality of ‘let’s enjoy it while it lasts and make the most of it while we can’. Fundamentally Israeli Jews believe that the world hates them because they are Jewish (in their mind it has nothing to do with colonialism or the Palestinians). So although Israel has brought its own situation upon itself, that is not how Israeli Jews see it. They believe things are ‘happening to them’ for no fault of their own. They expect isolation and have dropped all pretences to pander to the West and are behaving more in line now with their true nature. Even less radical people will become radicalised now in Israel. There will be even more propaganda and more brainwashing than ever before.

Netanyahu really does represent most Israeli Jews even though some of them do not like him. But the reasons they do not like him are not what you expect. Most Israeli Jews identify with Netanyahu’s perception and understanding of what the rest of the world is like and of the world’s relationship with Israel. After all Netanyahu is a product of Israeli society just like I was, and believe me, when you have that kind of psychology and that incredibly effective, powerful propaganda machine all around you, it is easy to believe that what you see is really how it is… Israeli Jews have always lived in a psychological ghetto and it’s that ghetto that I got out of back in 1991.

Life will get very difficult for Jews in Israel soon enough, and many with dual citizenship will abandon ship. Those who remain will be the die-hard fanatics and zealots who are dangerous because they might have the psychology of murder suicide. I believe that before it is over, things will get really bad there and extremely dangerous. Israel will become much more fanatic and extremist than ever before with a lot less inhibitions.

I am therefore worried about the Palestinians and wonder how much more of this they could possibly take and what they can expect in the next few months and years. Israel isolating itself is more dangerous for the Palestinians because world public opinion will no longer be a moderating factor on Israel’s behaviour. And believe it or not, it did have a moderating effect. What you have been seeing so far and what Palestinians have been experiencing is not yet the worst. Gaza gives you the idea of what Israel has in mind for all Palestinians.

So the message to those of us who support the Palestinians is to get ready to escalate our support. It is about to get very very tough. With Netanyahu at the helm the end of colonialism and occupation is nigh, but it is about to get a lot worse before it gets better.



About Avigail Abarbanel

Avigail Abarbanel was born and raised in Israel. She moved to Australia in 1991 and now lives in Scotland. She works as a psychotherapist in private practice and is an activist for Palestinian rights. She is the editor of Beyond Tribal Loyalties: Personal Stories of Jewish Peace Activists (Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2012).

- See more at: http://mondoweiss.net/author/avigail#sthash.Z4SeDj3e.dpuf