Of course, with MisterBibiNetanyahu involved – this is often pronounced as one word, especially by his opponents – the campaign was bound to get personal. He is a different sort of Israeli politician: young (46), facile, hot-tempered, relatively inexperienced. He did not work his way up through the party ranks, or lead the nation in battle – the usual paths to power. He stormed the parapets of “Nightline” and CNN. He is widely resented for this, called an “American-style” politician. He is assumed insubstantial, a sound-bite cowboy, an inappropriate successor to sober, stern Yitzhak Rabin (“Bibi Is Unsuitable” is another resonant Labor slogan). “Jews have had good leaders and bad, but never before have we had the prospect of a simple one,” says Meir Shalev, a well-known novelist and columnist. Even Netanyahu’s Likud allies lament, with very little prodding, his personal deficiencies. “He comes across very cold,” says one. “What’s he ever done?” says another. And yet, when Israel votes on May 29, he could win.
He could win for three reasons. First, his opponent is almost as unpopular: Shimon Peres, 73, has been around for a long time and never quite won the confidence of the Israeli public. He is considered an intellectual and called a “visionary,” which, in hardbitten Sabra politics, is a euphemism for highbrow schlemiel. He has promoted the vision of a “New Middle East,” in which Jews and Arabs cooperate, live and grow rich together. Most Israelis, even many who intend to vote for Peres, consider this a loopy fantasy at best. And that is another advantage Netanyahu has: his flagrant distrust of the Arabs, his unwillingness to even commit to shaking Yasir Arafat’s hand, seems a more familiar, perhaps safer path than Peres’s stated intention to trade the Golan Heights for peace with Syria and – more nervous-making still – his tropism toward a Palestinian state. “Our people tend to agree with Netanyahu on the peace process,” says Natan Sharansky, who is leading a party of Russian immigrants in the parliamentary elections. “But they consider Peres more learned and experienced. It will be very close between them.”
The other reason why Netanyahu could win is that he’s an American-style politician running in Israel’s first Amercian-style election: the two candidates for prime minister are standing independent of their parties (there is a separate election for the Knesset). This has changed the game in ways both subtle and profound. For the first time, candidates for prime minister must appeal directly to voters who are neither Labor nor Likud, but are “floating” undecided or members of Israel’s bedizened and often bizarre minority parties – a perplexing assortment of religious fanatics, ethnics (including Arabs) and ideologues. The polls have Peres slightly ahead, but there are complicating factors: huge, unpredictable new cohorts of immigrants (mostly Russians) and young people (a post-Yom Kippur war baby boom is coming of age) – and the terrorist vote has yet to be tabulated. It is widely assumed that Hizbullah and Hamas will try to influence the election and derail the peace process by blowing up more buses or lobbing more Katyushas. Last week there was a mild terrorist incident of a different sort: a Labor volunteer hanging campaign posters was shot in the leg by a Likudnik. “This is bad for us,” said one Likud leader. “The first thing everyone thinks about is Rabin. It’s only six months later and the right-wing meshugas are running around with guns again.”
The new rules have had a curious effect on the two main contenders. “They are riding each other’s horses,” says Meir Shalev. Netanyahu’s theme is Peace – with security. Peres’s theme is Security (and peace). This message massaging has been particularly difficult, one imagines, for Peres. First he had to establish his nonvisionary toughness by pounding Lebanon in response to Hizbullah rocket attacks. Then, in a far more wrenching move, he had to abandon his New Middle East formulation. He is now talking about “separation” from the Palestinians, a harsh but increasingly popular idea in Israel: the borders with the West Bank and Gaza, closed since the winter’s terror attacks, should remain closed. Crime has plummeted since the Palestinians were locked out, and many of the menial jobs that Arabs used to hold are now being filled by an army of more than 100,000 “guest” workers – primarily from Turkey, Eastern Europe and Asia. “Reality has shattered Shimon’s “vision’,” says Dan Meridor, a Likud leader.
Reality – and prosperity. “Economics is never a big issue in Israel,” Netanyahu insisted last week. But this year is, subtly, different: Israel is booming. The peace process has opened up trade and investment with countries – India, China and Japan, among others – that used to fear offending Arab oil suppliers. This has been a happy turn of events for Labor’s largely upscale, Ashkenazi (European Jewish) constituency. They’ve had the luxury of luxury, and of high-mindedness. But it also has pushed Netanyahu and Likud in a direction that bears an uncomfortable, if superficial, resemblance to the right-wing populism of Pat Buchanan (and, some would argue, Gennady Zyuganov’s Russian communists): they are the party of the poor, and of vehement reactionary nationalism. They remain the obsessed, pessimistic ethnic warriors – the Masada Party – at a moment when the global economy beckons.
The strengths, and weaknesses, of Netanyahu’s appeal were evident as he campaigned in a poor Sephardic neighborhood of Tel Aviv last week, a neighborhood literally called Hope (Hatikvah). Crowds screamed “Bibi!” and surged toward him – and were bowled over by a tight security cordon, young men with quiet eyes and sharp elbows surrounding the candidate. A father carrying his daughter in his arms was sent sprawling; an herb seller was crushed into his stall. This was a worst-case metaphor for a Likud government: security, but no peace. The candidate reached out, trying to get past his bodyguards and make contact with the people, but the distance was too great and Bibi Netanyahu found himself shaking hands with thin air.
