At the Likud meeting on Monday evening, Likud Central Committee members overwhelmingly voted to allow Liberman’s Yisrael Beiteinu to run together with the Likud as a joint list.

The attempts led by Likud MK Michael Eitan to have the vote done by secret ballot failed to collect enough signatures.

Netanyahu said that the decision to run together won’t change the Likud, but it would allow the Likud to change the State of Israel.

Liberman said the decision was a historic and important one that will strengthen Israel.

Liberman will take the number 2 position on the list, and Netanyahu reportedly offered him the choice of receiving the Finance, Defense or Foreign ministry. Liberman chose to remain as Foreign Minister.

The new joint list will receive 42 seats in the next Knesset elections next January, a Channel 2 News poll found on Sunday. It means that the parties will retain their current power.

The poll found that Shelly Yachimovich’s Labor party will get with 23 seats (up from 8). Shas 13 seats (up from 11) and Yair Lapid’s Yesh Atid party 9 seats. Left-wing Meretz will grow from 3 to 6 seats. The new National Union-New National Religious Party will drop to 5 seats, United Torah Judaism will stay at 5. Ehud Barak’s Independence party will get 3 seats. Kadima will drop from its current 28 seats to 3 seats. The Arab lists will get 10 seats altogether.

The merger of Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s Likud party and the Yisrael Beiteinu party of Foreign Minister Avigdor Liberman on Thursday has left-wing parties scrambling for a solution to the sudden show of solidarity on the part of the pro-nationalist camp.

In an article by Israel HaYom, an anonymous Kadima MK said unity on the left is a big item of discussion now, with emphasis on securing a great leader who will draw votes.

According to the MK, Kadima chairman Shaul Mofaz, Yesh Atid chairman Yair Lapid, and Labor chairwoman Shelly Yachimovich are being called on to unify under the leadership of either former Foreign Minister and failed almost-Prime Minister and Kadima chairwoman Tzipi Livni, or the recently acquitted former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert.

Both are expected to announce whether they will re-enter politics early next week.

Mofaz has said he will relinquish leadership of Kadima if either party needs the position in order to run for prime minister.

The strong Sephardic party, Shas, has expressed its concern over the Likud-Beiteinu merger, saying it could mean the drafting of Hareidi Jews into the army.

Yair Shamir, son of former prime minister Yitzhak Shamir (Likud), will be entering the political arena under the banner of the Yisrael Beytenu party.

His political debut will put him just under Foreign Minister Avigdor Liberman, at the party’s number 2 slot.

Shamir made the announcement on Friday, saying he believes his father would have considered joining the party due to their similar values of “freedom of the individual, wholeness of the nation and the land, and aliyah”.

Shamir, 67, is the former chairman of El Al airlines and Israel Aerospace Industries, as well as a former pilot and IAF Colonel.  He is now chair of the Shalem Center and Gvahim job-placement company for new olim, as well as a partner in Catalyst Investments.

The Florida Holocaust Museum, located at 55 Fifth Street South, St Petersburg, is proud to present the following new exhibits:

Reflections on Man’s Fate: The Art of Judith Weinshall Liberman, on view September 8, 2012 through January 20, 2013. The exhibit, drawn from the Florida Holocaust Museum’s permanent collection, is made up of paintings and textile work by award-winning artist Judith Weinshall Liberman.

The collection includes wall hangings and works on canvas from her Holocaust paintings, Holocaust wall hangings, skulls series and genocide series. Her work focuses on the present state of mankind as well as the relentlessness and enormity of history’s darkest period.

Liberman was born in Israel. She received four American university degrees including a J.D. degree from the University of Chicago Law School and LL.M degree from the University of Michigan Law School.

Liberman redirected her interest in law to her passion for art. She is the award-winning author-illustrator of “The Bird’s Last Song.” Her work has been exhibited in shows throughout the United States and abroad.

Letters to Sala: A Young Woman’s Life in Nazi Labor Camps, on view September 15 through December 31, 2012. The opening reception for the exhibit will be held on Thursday, September 20 at 7 p.m.

The power of the written word to sustain life is a theme of “Letters to Sala: A Young Woman’s Life in Nazi Labor Camps.” Sala Garncarz saved items including handwritten postcards, photographs and official documents from the time she entered the labor camp in 1940 until her liberation in 1945.

Ann Kirscher, daughter of the author, will attend the event as a special guest. The reception will be free to museum members and $16 per person for guests. RSVP at (727) 820-0100 ext 236.

Admission to the Florida Holocaust Museum is $16 for adults and $14 for seniors. Discounted admission is offered to students and to adult and student groups. Audio wands for the permanent collections are included in admission.

Admission is free to active duty military, museum members and children six and under. Museum hours are 10 a.m.-5 p.m., Monday through Sunday.

Call (727) 820-0100 or visit www.flholocaustmuseum.org for directions and further details including holiday closures. Limited free parking is available.

The government on Sunday voted to put a ministerial committee headed by the Prime Minister in charge of Jewish development in Judea and Samaria , the first time in 16 years that the establishment and expansion of Jewish communities in the biblical heartland will not come under the purview of the full government.

In 1996, then-and-current Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu established Decision 150, making the establishment of new communities contingent on full governmental approval.  The rescinding of that decision in 2012 makes the establishment of those communities the responsibility of an 11-member ministerial committee, with the approval of the defense minister.

The committee will be responsible for formulating policy pertaining to unauthorized construction in Judea and Samaria, as well as authorizing construction and demolitions, and it would formulate policies and principles pertaining to state responses to petitions to the High Court of Justice on Judea and Samaria land issues.

Education Minister Gideon Sa’ar called the creation of the committee significant.

Political analyst and Knesset insider Jeremy Man Saltan said the new arrangement has more to do with political maneuvering than the establishment of Jewish communities.  “This new committee strips Defense Minister Barak of some but not all of his authority over settlers and settlements,” Saltan told the Jewish Press.   “Most ministerial committees don’t meet that often and I don’t see the Chairman Prime Minister Netanyahu conducting weekly or even monthly meetings. It is a known Bibi trick to create a committee that rarely meets and buys him time. In reality this will mean very little to the settlement enterprise.”

Vice Premier Shaul Mofaz, Defense Minister Ehud Barak, Industry, Trade and Labor Minister Shalom Simhon and Government Services Minister Michael Eitan opposed the decision, with Vice Premier and Regional Development Minister Silvan Shalom, immigrant Absorption Minister Sofa Landver, Tourism Minister Stas Meseznikov, Public Security Minister Yitzhak Aharonovitch, and  Energy and Water Minister Uzi Landau abstaining.

The new committee will be headed by the prime minister, and will include Barak, Mofaz, Saar, Foreign Minister Avigdor Liberman, Strategic Affairs Minister Moshe Ya’alon, Diaspora Affairs Minister Yuli Edelstein, Interior Minister Eli Yishai, Environmental Protection Minister Gilad Erdan, Minister-without-Portfolio Bennie Begin and Science and Technology Minister Daniel Herschkowitz.

Peace Now executive director Yariv Oppenheimer warned that the committee would authorize additional communities in Judea and Samaria.

Foreign Minister and Israel Beytenu head Avigdor Liberman, speaking at a press conference before a party meeting, welcomed Kadima’s entrance into the coalition but stressed that the new government faces two major tests – finding a replacement for the Tal law and the impending evacuation of the Ulpana outpost.

“This is a coalition Israel needs,” Liberman said, but “these are the two most important tests, and I hope we’re wise enough to pass them.”

Referring to the Tal Law, which expires in August, he said that coalition chairman and Likud MK Ze’ev Elkin’s recent proposal was inadequate. “We will not accept it. We expect a serious proposal, and to be consulted about it. We will fight to make sure that the bill will be serious and comprehensive.”

In light of the High Court’s ruling on Monday that Ulpana must be evacuated and destroyed by July 1, he said: “I hope that we will quickly resolve the problem. The residents who have lived in Givat Ulpana for years are law-abiding citizens. This is not an illegal outpost. It is the state’s mistake, and it must take responsibility. There are ways to regulate the matter with legislation.”

Liberman supports the passage of a law that will circumvent the High Court’s ruling by legalizing Ulpana, especially in light of the fact that the state permitted Ulpana residents to build their homes and community.

Liberman also ridiculed Yair Lapid, who was preparing to shake up the political arena in the now-aborted early elections. “The chances of being elected president of the United States are much higher than the chances that his party will still exist in 2020. This is obviously a one-campaign party.”

http://rubinreports.blogspot.com/2012/05/one-leader-who-will-be-re-elected.html

Israel is apparently going to have elections this autumn and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will almost certainly win by a big margin. Understanding why explains a lot about the country that people think they know the most about but in fact comprehend the least.

According to polls, Netanyahu’s Likud party may go from 28 to 30 seats in the 120-member Knesset. That may not sound like a big percentage but with around 12 different parties likely to win seats that margin would be sufficient.

One key element in this equation is that the country is doing pretty well. True, it faces serious security problems but that’s the norm for Israel. Indeed, with no other trusted leader on the horizon, Netanyahu is the one most trusted to manage that dangerous situation.

True, too, there have been real social problems due largely to the gap between low salaries and high living costs that especially hurts younger people and provoked protests last year. That the protests have dissipated and Israel’s economy is doing better—including low unemployment, low inflation, and manageable state debt–than any other in the West, is partly due to the same economic problems that impose those social costs.

A third factor is the total fractionalization of the opposition. Indeed, one might speak of Netanyahu and the seven dwarfs. Aside from Kadima there are three other mid-sized parties that take votes from the same potential constituency and quarrel among themselves:

–Kadima, the main opposition party which is vaguely centrist, is so discredited by its former, failed leader Tzipi Livni that it will not be saved by its new head, the militarily competent but colorless Shaul Mofaz, from falling as far as losing 20 of its current 29 seats.

–Labor, which has reinvented itself as a social issues party and has an untested leader who is a radio personality, might come in a distant second.

–A new centrist party—named, perhaps in wishful thinking for itself—There is a Future—pushes the same secular centrism that has repeatedly produced one-election parties before.

–Israel Our Home, headed by Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, has a solid base among immigrants from the former Soviet Union but by that very fact—and given the fact that Lieberman is widely disliked and close to indictment—should hold but not expand its base.

It is ironic to think that the Obama Administration, whose ignorance of Israel and its politics cannot possibly be overestimated, thought it was going to bring down Netanyahu and replace him with a more pliable Livni. In fact, by its periodic bashing of Israel and ham-handed Middle East policy promoting Israel-hating Islamists, Obama unintentionally mobilized domestic support for Netanyahu.

Speaking about myths about Israel and Israeli politics here are some of the main ones:

–Netanyahu is no longer a “right-winger” in the way he was 15 years ago. He has moved into the center, a key factor explaining his success.

–Israelis do not believe they have a peace option at present, with the Palestinians uninterested in a deal, and Egypt, Iran, Turkey, the Gaza Strip, Lebanon, and Syria in an all-out hostile mode.

–There is no faith in U.S backing given the Obama Administration’s views and actions.

–Israeli are neither stupid—giving away everything, as the foreign right often seems to think—or evil, as the foreign left definitely does think.