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World
Key Vote
With Jerusalem on the precipice, mayoral election seen as crucial.
Dina Kraft
Jewish Telegraphic Agency
Jerusalem
I
t sounds like the beginning of a joke:
A rabbi, a Russian oligarch and a
high-tech millionaire are running for
mayor of Jerusalem.
Except there's no punch line, just each
of them offering himself as salvation for
the hallowed capital's many troubles.
Many Jerusalemites view this year's
municipal elections, scheduled for Nov. 11,
as a historic turning point for a city that is
Israel's poorest, still vulnerable to terrorist
attacks and wracked by economic, politi-
cal and religious divisions. At stake, many
say, is Jerusalem's very character and
future viability.
The election is "likely to be the most
crucial local ballot ever held in the mod-
em history of the capital: wrote Calev
Ben-David, a Jerusalem Post columnist and
longtime Jerusalemite.
Among the foremost concerns for
Jewish Israelis is the hemorrhaging of
Jerusalem's Jewish population, particularly
its middle class. These Israelis are being
driven out of the city by high housing
costs and scarce employment opportuni-
ties.
. For secular residents, the growth of
Jerusalem's fervently Orthodox popula-
tion is further cause for concern that the
Orthodox will dominate the personality
and priorities of the city.
In the predominately Arab eastern half,
where most residents long have refused
to vote in municipal elections in protest
of Israel's sovereignty over the city, basic
social services have been neglected for
years by City Hall. Many families live in
cramped quarters because building per-
mits are difficult to acquire, classroom
shortages are so bad that at some schools
different grades take turns using the same
room, and road repair and garbage collec-
tion are routinely ignored.
Some observers argue that the neglect
of eastern Jerusalem ensures that the
capital may again be divided by an inter-
national border. Within the city's Arab
community, many warn that the gap in
services leads to resentment that can be
seen in the growing political and religious
radicalization of Arab youth. Several times
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October 23 • 2008
this year, relatively young Palestinians
from eastern Jerusalem perpetrated ter-
rorist attacks against Jews in Jerusalem,
sometimes with deadly results.
Elias Khoury, a lawyer who represents
Arab residents of Jerusalem on issues of
property, building and residency rights,
says the boycott of municipal elections
by Jerusalem Arabs only hurts the com-
munity.
"Today, the situation in east Jerusalem
is tohu va'vohu," he said, using the biblical
term for chaos. "If we don't participate in
elections, we need an alternative to man-
aging our lives."
The youngest of the three candidates
is Nir Barkat, 49, a City Council member
who made his fortune developing pioneer-
ing anti-virus software in the 1990s. A sec-
ular Jerusalemite, Barkat advocates reviv-
ing the city and its economy by focusing
on tourism and making Jerusalem a
world-class center for medicine and life
sciences.
The Orthodox candidate is Rabbi Meir
Porush, a seventh-generation Jerusalemite
and longtime fixture on Israel's Orthodox
political scene who officially joined the
race at the last minute.
The current mayor, Uri Lupolianski,
who is fervently Orthodox, had agreed
to step aside for another Orthodox can-
didate, but it took the Orthodox political
establishment until the 11th hour to settle
on a final candidate. Several names were
floated, but Porush became the man of
choice only after disgraced ex-Shas Party
chairman and Knesset member Aryeh
Deri, who spent time in prison for taking
bribes, was disqualified from running
because his crimes constituted acts of
moral turpitude.
Porush, who advocates holding the
federal government accountable on unful-
filled pledges to invest millions of dollars
in Jerusalem, hopes to win the mayor-
alty by galvanizing the city's powerful
Orthodox voting bloc. Orthodox residents
make up 30 percent of the city's Jewish
population but comprised the majority of
voters in the city's last municipal election,
helping usher in Lupoliansky, the city's
first Orthodox mayor, in 2003.
Porush cites Jerusalem's Arab-Jewish
demography as the city's greatest chal-
lenge. He said the first thing he would do
as mayor would be to declare "an emer-
An Orthodox man speaks with party activists for mayoral candidate Arcadi
Gaydamak at Jerusalem's Mahane Yehudah market.
gency situation" to boost the city's Jewish
population, which stands at about 66
percent.
"If this problem is not dealt with, we
will lose Jerusalem;' Porush said.
Rounding out the field is Arcady
Gaydamak, Israel's flashiest political
enigma, a billionaire who says he speaks
for the people.
Gaydamak's past includes an interna-
tional arrest warrant for allegedly illicit
arms dealing in Angola and paying out
of his own pocket to house Israelis flee-
ing the rocket fire in the north during the
2006 Lebanon war.
Zuhir Hamdan, who briefly ran as
Jerusalem's first Arab mayoral candidate,
recently joined Gaydamak's campaign in
the hope of becoming his adviser on Arab
affairs if Gaydamak is elected.
On a recent campaign foray to
Jerusalem's open-air Mahane Yehudah
market, Barkat shook hands and smiled
for the cameras in his charcoal gray suit
and Oxford shirt.
"My goal and mission in life is to build
the future of Jerusalem:' he told a gather-
ing of foreign journalists before outlining
his plans, which include tapping interna-
tional philanthropists and private-sector
funds for support for Jerusalem.
Addressing the poverty issue, he
noted that the average Jewish income in
Jerusalem is $16,000 annually, compared
to $24,000 in the Tel Aviv area and just
$4,000 among Arab residents of eastern
Jerusalem.
All of the candidates are trying to woo
voters on the issue of affordable housing.
Foreign demand for property in Jerusalem
has contributed to skyrocketing housing
prices and a dearth of new middle-class
housing. Most of the city's current build-
ing projects are luxury housing for dias-
pora Jewish buyers, with prices per square
meter ranging from $7,000 to $10,000.
The high cost of living in Jerusalem has
driven many residents to the suburbs.
Two new parties comprised of young
Jerusalemites have made the issue their
focus in the race for City Council seats.
Aimed at trying to stem the tide of young
people fleeing the city, one party is made
up predominately of university students
and other 20-somethings and is called
Hit'orerut — Hebrew for "wake up."
Earlier this month, it merged with the
other like-minded party, Yerushalmim
— Hebrew for "Jerusalemites."
"We need a change, and we understood
it had to come from within:' said Ofir
Berkovitz, 25, the head of Hit'orerut.
Party leaders helped organize a dem-
onstration several months ago in which
activists piled suitcases on their cars and
drove to the city's entrance with mega-
phones blaring, "Don't leave us with no
choice but to leave!" E