‘What if there aren't free and fair elections in Israel in October? What are we going to do?’
About this episode
The episode discusses the potential implications of non-free and fair elections in Israel, focusing on public sentiment towards Netanyahu and his government.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu may be even more unpopular than the current polling demonstrates, Haaretz columnist Joshua Leifer said on this week’s edition of the Haaretz Election Podcast. “I have begun to think the polling is not telling the whole story,” he said, in a discussion on how voters who believe Netanyahu is causing irreversible damage to Israeli democracy and want him removed are currently ping-ponging between “optimism and apocalyptic thinking.” The “apocalyptic thinking,” Leifer said, involves speculation as to whether Netanyahu, anticipating defeat, somehow uses the precarious security situation to prevent free and fair elections on the scheduled date. "After everything we've experienced over the last four years, can we rule out that apocalyptic scenario? We can't rule it out, sadly," he said. Haaretz correspondent Judy Maltz , who joined Leifer and host Allison Kaplan Sommer on the weekly podcast panel, said she observed much of this disquiet with the country’s leader as she travels the country to speak with voters ahead of the October 27 election, from Arab cities to upscale suburbs to West Bank…
People in this episode
Host: Allison Kaplan Sommer
Guests: Joshua Leifer, Judy Maltz
Topics covered
- Israeli elections
- Benjamin Netanyahu
- democracy
- voter sentiment
- political instability
Keywords
- Israel
- elections
- Netanyahu
- democracy
- voter sentiment
- political instability
- Haaretz
Mentioned in this episode
Organizations: Haaretz, National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich
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