There is something extraordinary about Israel's election, and it is easily overlooked amid the noise, recriminations and apocalyptic warnings surrounding the campaign: Israelis may be about to remove a government that has presided over a great catastrophe, undermined its democratic institutions and brought it to international isolation. And they may accomplish this through the simple, peaceful act of voting. The presence of a true liberal democracy in the Middle East is an inconvenient truth for Western anti-Zionists who too often find themselves defending repressive tyrannies in their opposition to Israel.
Israel is surrounded by countries where meaningful elections are non-existent, tightly controlled or endlessly postponed. Palestinians have not been allowed to vote in 20 years. Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates are absolute or highly centralized monarchies.
Syria has emerged from decades of dictatorship without establishing a fully democratic system. Across much of the region, the idea that citizens might simply dismiss their rulers through competitive elections remains fanciful. Israel, by contrast, has a genuinely competitive multiparty system, a vigorous opposition, an independent press and a judiciary that has continued to resist political interference.
Arab citizens of Israel are also able to vote. Its democracy is flawed, because thousands of Palestinians live under Israeli occupation in the West Bank without voting rights for the Knesset—but Israel has not annexed the area and this can still be fixed. In a region where political change so often comes through violence, coups or dynastic succession, all of this is no small achievement.
Moreover, Israel is a society that is capable of having the most wrenching conversation with itself about the future. Nor is it a foregone conclusion that the system will deliver change. Benjamin Netanyahu's coalition has been polling short of the 61 seats needed for a majority in the 120-member Knesset.
An October 23 Maariv poll projected just 48 seats for his governing bloc, with a potentially substantial majority for parties opposed to him. The opposition's leading figure, former military chief Gadi Eisenkot, heads a party projected to be its largest. But even if Netanyahu loses his majority, the opposition may struggle to form a government because several of its leaders have ruled out relying on Arab parties, whose parliamentary support will likely be indispensable—and which, in the current tense environment, is awkward.
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