Netanyahu delighted by Cameron victory, and maybe a little jealous too
His party didn’t get anything like a majority of the UK votes, and yet Cameron could claim victory within hours. What a contrast to Netanyahu’s 42-day coalition struggle
Add ToI as a Preferred Source on GoogleDavid Horovitz is the founding editor of The Times of Israel. He is the author of "Still Life with Bombers" (2004) and "A Little Too Close to God" (2000), and co-author of "Shalom Friend: The Life and Legacy of Yitzhak Rabin" (1996). He previously edited The Jerusalem Post (2004-2011) and The Jerusalem Report (1998-2004).
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was understandably quick to tweet his congratulations to David Cameron, hailing his British counterpart’s electoral success in the early hours of Friday morning, saying he looked forward to working with the Conservative victor in the coming years “on shared goals of peace & prosperity.”
From Netanyahu’s perspective, Cameron’s reelection must have made for sweet viewing — offset only, perhaps, by a rueful sense that the British electoral system, if adopted here, might have made his own political life just a little easier.
As with Netanyahu on March 17, Cameron’s victory made an absolute mockery of the opinion surveys, which had the Conservatives and Labour neck-and-neck, just as the polls here had Likud and Zionist Union neck-and-neck. (Really, pollsters worldwide need to be fundamentally re-evaluating their working methods or contemplating alternative careers.)
As in the Israeli elections, the geeky Jewish guy running the center-left opposition was soundly defeated.
Congrats to @David_Cameron on impressive victory & renewed mandate. I look forward to working with you on shared goals of peace & prosperity
— Prime Minister of Israel (@IsraeliPM) May 8, 2015
From an Israeli diplomatic perspective, Netanyahu could hardly have wished for a rosier outcome. Cameron is regarded in Jerusalem as firmly supportive. The House of Commons did vote in favor of Palestinian statehood in a non-binding motion last October. Britain is going along merrily with the P5+1 powers’ nuclear deal with Iran. And Britain tends to abstain on UN votes where Israel would like it to vote no — including Security Council resolutions on Palestinian statehood. But the reelected British prime minister is regarded in Jerusalem as “one of the most pro-Israel PMs ever,” diplomats here say, and Ed Miliband was never going to compete for that title.
Cameron was the party leader who told the Jewish Chronicle last week, “Israel uses its weapons to defend its people and Hamas uses its people to defend its weapons.” And, “Israel is trying to defend against indiscriminate attacks, while trying to stop the attackers.”
Miliband, by radical contrast, was the party leader who said of last summer’s war with Hamas, “I cannot explain, justify or defend the horrifying deaths of hundreds of Palestinians, including children and innocent civilians.” And, “We oppose the Israeli incursion into Gaza… I don’t think it will help win Israel friends.”
So, not too many tears being shed in Jerusalem over Miliband’s ballot-box humiliation and immediate resignation.
Nor over the evisceration of the Liberal-Democrats, Cameron’s former coalition partners who lost almost all of their seats — a party which would at various times have barred arms sales to Israel if it had its way. Nor over the defeat of Lib-Dem MP David Ward, who publicly empathized with Palestinian terrorism last summer and declared that it made him “sick” to see Netanyahu attend the mass demonstration of unity against terrorism in Paris in January.
The ouster of MP George Galloway may also have raised a wry smile in Jerusalem — the most virulently anti-Israel MP sent packing by the voters of Bradford West, and fulminating with characteristic bile in his farewell speech that “the vile, the racists and the Zionists will all be celebrating.”
There was no complete sweep of Israel-bashers from the benches of the House of Commons — perennial critic Sir Gerald Kaufman, for instance, was safely reelected, and is now the “Father of the House,” parliament’s elder statesman. But, hey, you can’t have everything.
Where there might be a hint of jealousy in Netanyahu’s congratulations for Cameron lies in the different shares of parliament produced by the very different electoral systems. Cameron’s party didn’t get anything like a majority of the votes nationwide — in fact, the Conservatives took about 37% — and yet there he was, going off to see the Queen early on Friday afternoon, less than 15 hours after the polling stations closed, to tell her his Conservatives would be the next government, having secured a single-party majority in parliament under the constituency system.
What a contrast to Netanyahu who, even though his Likud won an impressive quarter of Israel’s votes, needed 42 days, and had to relinquish many of the top posts in his government, to cobble together the narrowest of coalition majorities.
For Cameron, the future is rosy. He’s steered his Conservatives to a sweeping reelection, and holds power more completely in the new parliament than he did in the old. Netanyahu lifted Likud to 30 seats, and yet can only look forward to endless battling with four coalition partners who each have the capacity to bring him down.
Cameron’s opposition will actually be sitting, relatively helplessly, on the opposition benches — a battered Labour Party, the spectacularly successful Scottish National Party (Britain’s version of the Joint Arab List?), and sundry others. Netanyahu’s most potent opposition will likely be inside his government, with Jewish Home’s Naftali Bennett at the fore.
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