Israel’s Left Lost The Public’s Trust

(JNS) The Israeli public has already made its voice clear: It wants the right in power. While many right-wingers and centrists don’t give high marks to the Likud, they are not going to vote for left-wing parties but rather for other parties in the same ideological camp, including many who wrongly claim that Israel’s democracy is under threat. In light of the fact that the right’s base of support is actually centrist, the polls show only one clear thing: The left’s appeal has been shrinking.

There was a time when parties tried to cast themselves as something they are not. The precursor to the Labor Party, Mapai, used to be a centrist party during the pre-statehood period and definitely during the 1960s and 1970s, both on socioeconomic matters and on national security and foreign policy. But it cast itself as a Socialist party in order to set itself apart from the right, which it often portrayed as fascist and whose urbanites it mocked.

In these historical circumstances, the right was an outcast among those who saw themselves as champions of freedom and democracy. In other words, the center cast itself as left, whereas the right was relegated to fringe status.

These days the situation is reversed: Those who want to win over the core of the Israeli electorate go out of their way to make sure they are not perceived as leftists. The left is automatically suspect, and rightly so, as being reluctant to embrace Israel’s Jewish character and Zionist goals.