I find this to be a striking piece of legislation. Let us examine it from the points of view of the co-sponsors. First Beilin.
Beilin supported the idea of direct election when the issue last came up for discussion, in 1991. At that time, he was in the opposition, and poised to mount a serious campaign for a prominent position in Labour's upper echelon. he is young and charismatic, and aligned himself perfectly in Shimon Peres's back pocket. When Peres became Prime Minister late last year, Beilin was rearded with a cabinet position, and his future seems assured within the party.
But I wonder at his sudden change of heart regarding the direct election. Could it be that since his candidate lost, and he was therefore knocked out of the cabinet, that all of a sudden he doesn't think the direct election is such a good idea? Now that Labour lost, they want to go back to the old style of politics in Israel. Beilin is worried that should he become Labour leader, he will have a tough time against the equally young and charismatic Netanyahu.
Uzi Landau is almost the exact opposite, and for him this position is more confusing. His party won the election last month, almost directly because of the direct election law. Had that reform not been in place, there is a good chance that Labour would have won the election, and Israel would continue to be given away for nothing. Peace would remain the farthest thing from reality in Israel.
I met Landau in Israel a year ago, and I asked him about the direct election. He told me then that he was against it since it concentrated too much power in the hands of the Prime Minister. He would rather go back to the old system as well. I agree -- partially.
The concentration of power is not as absolute as Landau would have you believe. To the extent that it does exist, and it does, it is not healthy for Israel. But if such power is so concentrated, how does one explain the meteoric rise of smaller parties such as the religious?
The answer is that the power that is concentrated is not that of the government, but that of the Likud. That is an internal Likud party problem, created by Netanyahu, and one that needs to be solved only within the Likud Central Committee. However, I believe that without even this internal concentration, the Likud would have lost the election far worse than it did. This is because the party is extremely lacking in real leadership beyond the top two or three members on the list. This problem is endemic throughout the Likud, and is the primary reason they lost the 1992 election.
Landau's ulterior motive for challenging this law is his own self-interest as a mid-level Knesset member. Many of his colleagues lost their seats in this election as a result of the rise of the small parties. That is what he and other Likud Members would have you believe. But in reality, they lost their seats because of the merger of Likud, Tsomet and Gesher. This union would not have been necessary had the Likud been able to present a party strong enough in leadership to attract voters for its own reasons rather than as a mere protest vote.
One of the reasons stated by Beilin and Landau for their presentation of the bill today is their fear for the country at the rise of the small parties and the weakening of the larger ones. Well... First, there is nothing wrong with the rise of the small parties. If more people decide to support their ideals, there is no reason to limit this support. Direct election of the Prime Minister merely allows that support, always latent but hidden in deference to the Prime Ministerial candidates, to show through without damaging the chances of the Prime Ministerial candidates. If anything, this law boosts democracy in that it allows for the real representatives of public opinion to be heard in the Knesset. More than one quarter of all Israelis are religious Jews. There is no reason they shouldn't be represented according to their numbers. That one in six Knesset members is from a religious party is merely a step in that direction. Are Beilin and Landau so ready to ignore so sizeable a segment of their population? If so, it just illustrates my point about weak leadership in Israel.
Second, if Beilin and Landau really want to prevent the rise of the small parties, let them effect changes in their own parties, which are very necessary, to make their parties more attractive to the voter. The direct election bill thus makes necessary internal party changes to guarantee stronger leadership in a country sorely in need of such strength.
Third, Beilin and Landau can spout on righteously about their fear for the country all they want. In reality, Beilin did more to damage Israel than any other junior member of Knesset in the last fifty years, through his constant leadership of the Oslo process in Israel. Landau, by his selfish concern for his seat, over his concern for the opinions of the public, is certainly not helping Israel to any great degree.
If the small parties are the public's answer to the problem of leadership in Israel, they should be represented as they are. Perhaps they can come up with something better than the blind weakness of Labour and Likud. At the very least, the major parties should begin inspecting themselves very carefully and injecting new life into their leadership corps. The nation is crying out for it.
Copyright 1996. Reproduction in electronic or print format by permission only.
