Labor Party Contest Becomes Bitter Fight (Forward, June 10, 2005)

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TEL AVIV — Three weeks before the primary elections for the leadership of the Labor Party, the sleepy dowager of Israeli politics suddenly seems abuzz with activity. Five men are battling desperately to lead Israel's second-largest political party and occupy the seat once held by the likes of David Ben-Gurion and Yitzhak Rabin.

It is a curious battle, considering that nobody expects the winner of the June 28 primary to become Israel's next prime minister. Optimists see the contest as a fight for the right to rebuild Labor as a fighting opposition once Sharon's disengagement is completed. Cynics call it an opportunity to try reviving a corpse. Still, the fight is as bitter and ruthless as Israel has seen in a long time.

Of the five contenders, two have been to the top already — namely former prime ministers Shimon Peres and Ehud Barak. A third, former defense minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer, is the only Labor chairman who never had the chance to lead his party into national elections, having been deposed in midterm by Amram Mitzna in 2003.

The other two contenders have emerged as possible spoilers from the party's pre-primary registration period, which ended this past Tuesday. One, of them, Matan Vilnai, is in the traditional Labor mold: an Ashkenazic ex-general like Rabin, Barak and Mitzna. The other, Amir Peretz, is a dark horse — in more ways than one.
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Peretz, chairman of the Histadrut — the still-mighty trade union federation — is a completely different political animal. Moroccan born, he entered politics as a union activist in the Negev development town of Sderot, went on to become mayor and then a Knesset back-bencher, but was never considered leadership material by the party's Ashkenazic-dominated old guard. In 1994 he left the party, along with his friend and ally Haim Ramon. Together they mounted an unprecedented insurgency that ousted Labor from control of the Histadrut, its main power base. A year later, Ramon, the better known of the two, returned to Labor, where he has been under a cloud ever since because of his role in downsizing the union. Peretz stayed on as Histadrut chief, steadily gaining popularity as the main opponent of Finance Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's neoliberal economic policies. He finally rejoined Labor last year, bringing his own power base with him.

Peretz represents a unique prospect for Labor. The party has been obsessed for years with its image as a shrinking bastion of the old elites, out of touch with "the people." Peretz, the immigrant child of the Other Israel, is everything the party isn't. Even the ex-generals, who once wouldn't have dreamed of playing second fiddle to someone like Peretz, are beginning to understand his potential. At press time, he was expecting an imminent declaration of support from former navy commander and former Shin Bet security service chief Ami Ayalon. Vilnai is said to have reached an understanding with him to join forces behind whoever does best in the primaries.

When he spoke to the Forward this week, Peretz estimated that some 30,000 newly registered Labor members are his supporters, "and unlike others, they will be there on Election Day." This alone, he believes, should be enough to move him into the two-man runoff that is expected. He also believes that he will get a significant share of votes among the 25,000 Israeli Arab voters, most of whom were signed up by backers of his rival Ben-Eliezer.

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[ 09 June 2005: Message edited by: robbie_dee ]

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Peretz brings a left-wing perspective on both the peace process and social issues, a unique combination. For years, he has stressed more than the other candidates the link between wasting money on the settlements and the distress of the weaker elements in society. He has promoted an egalitarian worldview and has come up through the ranks from mayor of Sderot through the Histadrut Labor Federation to the Knesset, and not from chief of staff to cabinet.

While labor unions in Europe are a source of support for social-democratic parties, in Israel the Labor Party has become identified more and more with Tel Aviv and the kibbutzim. Peretz's candidacy can open the party to a new following, and a more civilian agenda, and it is to be hoped he will not evade the presentation of his policy on the peace process. Even if the party's members prefer a different candidate, Labor must not topple Peretz's candidacy, thus giving up the different agenda he represents.

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American Prospect: Is the Israeli Labor Party Ready for a Pocket Book Primary?

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The political thinking has been that Israel needs a strong military leader to run its political wing, too -- at least until there is a resolution to the conflict with the Palestinians. (Though Shimon Peres doesn’t have a military background, he is the father of Israel’s nuclear program and that gives him some security cache). But, the reality is that it’s been the right -- the Likud -- that has been able to capture populist majoritarian sentiment, even while it has instituted draconian privatization and welfare measures modeled on Margeret Thatcher.

The elitism of the dovish left -- coupled with neo-liberal policies -- have been a complete turn off to the voters who should be supporting a left-wing peace agenda. And it’s these economic policies that have eroded much of the electoral support that Labor -- and the peace camp -- need to build support for a final status arrangement with the Palestinian. Then, there’s Amir Peretz.

Born in Morocco, he came to Israel with his family when he was four years old and settled in Sderot, a Negev development town (the one where the Kassam rockets from Gaza fell t throughout the Intifada). He was badly wounded in the Israeli army (he walks with a limp) and returned to Sderot, where he rose through the ranks of the local workers’ council to become mayor at age 30. He ran -- and won -- in Labor’s open primaries in 1988, entering the Knesset for the first time. He was an early support of Peace Now, one of the few political leaders from the Moroccan Jewish community to do so. But his political vision was always more populist than other dovish leaders.

In a 2003 interview, he told me: "I am a peace person, and I fully support the establishment of a Palestinian state, but in Israel if you ask someone if they are left or right, they will tell you about Abu Mazen or Arafat, not about single mothers."

Israel, Peretz insists, can't afford high levels of inequality.

"The State of Israel demands from its citizens to sacrifice its most precious thing," he said. "All our sons are recruited into the army. On the front we are totally equal. When they return from the field, the state is not committed to anything. Our solidarity is the guarantee for our existence."

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