Digital Campaigns’ Trends in the General Elections for the 24th Knesset Spotlight Social media platforms have significantly changed the ways in which political campaigns are run, due to their tremendous effect on how we form opinions and attitudes, as well as on our choice as to whether to become politically involved. This Spotlight focuses on the digital campaigns that accompanied the general elections for the 24th Knesset on March 2021. By Sharon Haleva-Amir
"We work to make the political campaigning environment more trustworthy, transparent and comprehensible for people." Interview A conversation with Sam Jeffers, Co-Founder of "Who Targets Me", about the power of social media, and particularly, of social media advertising in influencing people in election campaigns and ways of making the political campaigning environment more trustworthy, transparent and comprehensible for people.
AI and Elections – Observations, Analyses and Prospects Spotlight This Spotlight explores how the ability of AI to disseminate information more effectively is prone to abuse and can pose a threat to democracy. It then discusses the preconditions and potential of AI to support the building of a critical public sphere. By Jessica Heesen
Voting for Equality? Interview Interview with Ghaida Rinawie-Zoabi on her candidacy for Meretz and the prospects for Jewish-Arab equality By Steffen Hagemann and Inbal Shtivi
The Crisis of the Zionist Left Analysis What happened to the Israeli Peace Camp? Is the two-states solution dead? Where is the Israeli left? This special project introduces an ambitious attempt to answer these big questions by shedding light on some of the key dynamics and developments within Israeli society and especially within the Israeli left. By Oz Aruch
Alleged Voter Fraud: The Most Dangerous Lie Had there not been so many political storylines in the news avalanche ahead of Israel’s second general election in 2019, one might have been inclined to see it as Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu last straw: On September 3, two weeks before the voters again went to the polling stations, Netanyahu went public with the allegation that had it not been for widespread voter fraud in Israeli-Arab communities in the April election, his right-wing coalition would have passed the 61-seat threshold needed to gain a majority in the Knesset. By Henning Christian Lahmann
Israeli Elections 2019 – Round Two Between triumph and failure lay only six weeks: On the night of April 9, 2019, Benjamin Netanyahu was celebrating with his followers as the shining winner of the Israeli parliamentary election. Once again, Netanyahu seemed to have made it, despite allegations of corruption and a broad-based opposition campaign against the continuation of the Israeli Prime Minister's right-wing coalition. On May 30, however, Netanyahu had to admit his failure – he had failed to forge a viable coalition within the six-week deadline. In order to prevent the Israeli president from giving the opposition candidate the task of forming a government, the newly established Israeli parliament (the 21st Knesset) dissolved in a Likud led maneuver just before Netanyahu’s deadline and voted for new elections on September 17, 2019. By Steffen Hagemann, Romy Shapira and Elisheva Gilad
Benjamin Netanjahu vor 5. Amtszeit: Das rechtsreligiöse Lager gewinnt die Parlamentswahlen 2019 By Steffen Hagemann
Right-wing Parties in the 2019 Israeli Elections Analysis The 2019 Israeli elections will be determined on the issue of how many right-wing parties pass the 3.25% threshold and what their relative strength will be vis-à-vis the left bloc. Who are the rightwing parties, how did the religious and ultra-religious parties become “the natural partners” of Netanyahu's ruling Likud party, and what is the subtle interplay between them in view of the 2019 elections? By Gayil Talshir
Women, Security and Israeli Politics – Going Backwards Based on international comparisons, Israel is in a 'good' spot in the middle. The number of women in the Knesset, the Israeli parliament, reached a record high last year, but even then they accounted for only 30% of all Knesset Members (34 out of the 120 Knesset members). The first quarter of 2019 catches Israel at the height of an election campaign. However, it is already projected that following the elections the number of women Members of Knesset will be even lower. And, as everyone knows, the head count tells only part of the story. By Anat Saragusti
