City Council and the next 5 years

Today, finally is Election Day!

While the mayoral race has been bizarre, my choice for mayor was pretty clear. On the other hand, deciding to whom to support (and vote for) for the Jerusalem City Council has been difficult. While it was clear to me that the haredi parties--Yahadut HaTorah (Ashkenazim a tenuous amalgam of  two political parties, Agudat Yisrael [Hasidim] and Degel Torah [Yeshiva, non-hassidim]) and Shas (Sefardim)--would garner the most number of seats and thus, control the council, my concern was who would be the non-haredi component.

I knew I wasn't voting for a haredi party. I knew I wasn't voting for the "usual" parties/factions either, Meretz (too left wing and an coalition of other groups I'm not willing to support), Nir Barkat list (especially since he dumped Naomi Tsur and reconnected with Meir Turgeman), LikudBeiteinu (who I won't support on a national level), Bayit HaYehudi (ran an anemic campaign with a bunch no-name people, but more later). After the winnowing of a few smaller groups/factions, it left me with three viable options; Hitorarut, Yerushalmim and Ometz Lev. I knew at least a couple of people in each list.

Hitorarut is a secular oriented group of young people trying to make Jerusalem livable for young families/people who are generally secular. They have been running programs for the betterment of the city for last almost a decade.

Ometz Lev was set up by Naomi Tsur, in large part because she wasn't being given a realistic place on Nir Barkat's list. She recruited another female councilor and created a women's faction. Of the top ten places, the 5th and 10th were allotted to men and the rest were (highly qualified) women.

Yerushalmim is headed by Rachel Azaria and she too created an interesting mix of people for her list. A number of the people are either religious or traditional, so their focus has been on creating a Jewishly open city. Rachel Azaria was very active in promoting young families, directly confronting the haredization of the city (separate seating buses, defending./supporting the merchants of Ramot mall). She was in the coalition but when she sued the City she got kicked out and was 'ineligible' to be a Deputy Mayor.

Frankly, they're all competing for the same population cohort. Each claimed the other won’t pass the voter threshold.

Why couldn't they join forces and create a strong non-haredi voice/presence on the council?

In a word, personal egos and styles.

• In the last election (2008), Hitorarut and Yerushalmim ran together on the same list. Rumor has it that a donor (or a few) would only give them money if they ran together. Shortly after the election, Rachel Azaria/Yerushalmim struck off on her own.
• They don’t speak to each other. Each has their own working style. Naomi Tsur who is older and comes from the mainstream non-profit world seeks to work the system. Rachel Azaria is young(er) and comes from the activist world, where noise and direct confrontation is the modus operandi (and maybe also vivendi). From a conversation with an Ometz Lev volunteer, despite both being datiot [religiously observant], I got the distinct impression they can’t stand each other—a kulturkampf. At the youngest and most secular is Hitorarut. Not sure the former two ‘respect’ them enough.
• Everyone wants to be the leader and at the top of the list.

In terms of not being able to work together is also an issue for the religious parties, the religious nationalist community and within the Ashkenazi yeshiva (non-hassidim)haredi group. Instead of each group running a unified list, each due to internal politics, their vote will be splintered.

With all the internal splits, I wonder if each faction will cancel each other out.

Of all the options, the bottom line was feeling assured that the faction I vote for will pass the vote threshold. (A vote for a party that fails to garner enough votes—estimated at 7,000—will be considered spoiled and not considered a valid vote for determining the allocation of seats.)

Unfortunately, polls are neither available nor reliable. Based on what I read in Friday’s newspaper, it seemed clear that Ometz Lev was off the radar. In Kol Ha’ir, they didn’t receive 1% support. Their predication was:

8 seats: Yahadut HaTorah (15.8%)

4 seats: Yerushalmim (11.1%), Barkat List (9.8%) and Shas (9.6%)

3 seats: Hirorarut (8.9%) and Bayit HaYehudi (6.0%)

1 seat: United Jerusalem {split off of Bayit HaYehudi+another faction} (4.4%), Meretz+ (4.4%), Pisgat Zeev (3.6%), LikudBeiteinu (3.1%) and Tov [moderate haredi] (2.7%)

Based on the above, I held my nose and voted for Azaria.

Now, let’s see the actual results.