Meet Yair Lapid, Israel’s Next Prime Minister?

Is this the end of Bibi Netanyahu?

Some of you have commented that you have not heard from me in a while. The reasons are simple. I only write when I have something to say. It is the blessing of rabbinic retirement where every week had one or two deadlines that needed to be filled whether I had something to say or not. The other reason and admittedly a more respectful one is that we were away in New York last week to celebrate grandchild number 5, Jonah Meir Plotkin’s Bar Mitzvah. I say this with full bias, he was terrific; and seeing all three of my children, and two of the grandchildren for the first time in 16 months was a special treat. Even better, 2 months ago we were not sure there would be any celebration or that we would travel to New York without a quarantine, and last week all adult family members were vaccinated and could break bread outdoors with no mask. When I saw my mechutan, I gave him an elbow bump and he said, ”You can do better than that”, and I realized he was correct, so we hug and it felt so good. As my daughter-in-law said in her speech, “This was not just a simcha but a reunion” and she was right on the mark. The joy of people being together with no mask and no fear never felt so good. We are not all the way back, but we are getting there.

The world does not stop even for Jonah’s Bar Mitzvah, and Bibi has been unable to form a government in Israel. The task has been given to Yair Lapid the head of the Yesh Atid party, which means,” There Is a Future”. He is a centrist and will have the difficult task of coming up with a coalition government of the right, the center, and perhaps the Israeli Arabs. If he joins with the right-wing Naftali Bennet, he has offered to split the 4 years with each being prime minister for two years and Naftali can be PM first. If it happens it will end Bibi’s 12 years as Prime Minister.

Israeli Politics can be Machiavellian so we don’t know how this will end but I want to share a little with you about Yair.

He used to be a news anchor on Israeli TV. His father “Tommy Lapid” was a journalist and later a politician who wanted to separate the religious parties from the government. Yair is telegenic, speaks well in English as well as Hebrew, and while more moderate than his father, he also wanted to reduce the role of religious parties in the government as well as their monopolistic hold on Judaism in Israel. He ran the first time on a platform demanding that Yeshiva students all serve in the army.

Forming a unity government with a Zionist religious right winger like Bennet will not be easy but as he wrote, “After two years of an ongoing political nightmare, Israeli society is wounded…A unity government isn’t a compromise, it is a goal. It is on us to form a government that reflects the fact that we do not hate one another”.

The above information is widely known but I want to share with you something that is not widely reported but speaks to the menshlichkeit of this man. Sometime after he first entered politics probably in 2012 he spoke to the Rabbinical Assembly in convention. When he first accepted the speaking invitation there was no election on the horizon. Subsequently Bibi called for an election and the speaking engagement was right in the middle of the campaign. I would guess that anyone else would have cancelled flying over to America in the midst of the campaign to speak to Conservative Rabbis who have no vote and very little influence in Israeli elections, but he refused to cancel, much to the chagrin of his political advisors. Instead, he got on a plane, arrived in the US, spoke to us and caught a plane back to Israel that night.

Why?

Because he thought it was important to keep close connections with diaspora Jews to further Zionist unity and even more he had given his word that he was coming. I was so very impressed.

Good luck Yair, I hope Israel can finally have a unity government.

I am leaving for Canada this week and assuming the government allows me in, I will be away until September. Though I am retired, for some reason when in Whistler I feel like I am on vacation, so I anticipate writing less often. Then again, the world keeps moving so you will still hear from me if less frequently. Enjoy the freedom of vaccinations, eat some blintzes and cheese cake ( Trader Joe’s has a good NY style cake) on Shavuot, and have a great and healthy summer.