LIVE BLOG: Labor Party leadership spill in Australia

UPDATE: Kevin Rudd has not challenged prime minister Julia Gillard, and Australia’s Labor Party leader will continue in that role after winning a snap leadership spill. * * * * What a day in Australia! Simon Crean (pictured above), Australia’s minister for arts and regions, a former leader of the Australian Labor Party from 2001 [...]

Why Western Australia doesn’t necessarily spell the end for Gillard

Saturday’s state elections in Western Australia were not good news for the Labor Party or for its leader, Australian prime minister Julia Gillard (pictured above). First off, it’s important to note that no one expected Labor to win the election — premier Colin Barnett faced an electorate largely satisfied with the direction of the state’s [...]

Four things that the Netanyahu-Livni deal tells us about Israel’s next government

With word that Tzipi Livni, former foreign minister and leader of Hatnuah (התנועה, ‘The Movement’), will become the first major figure to join prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s governing coalition for a third term in office, nearly a month after Israel’s legislative elections, we’ve reached a new critical phase of the coalition-building process. Livni will not only [...]

Winners and losers in today’s Israeli election

Official results will start trickling in shortly from Israel, where it’s well past midnight, but we have some fairly strong exit poll data at this point. From the looks of things, the center-right and the ultraorthodox haredim parties have taken just slightly more seats than the center-left and the Arab parties in Israeli’s Knesset (הכנסת).  Israeli [...]

Who is Yair Lapid?

The news out of Israel throughout election day — now confirmed by preliminary exit polling — is that Yair Lapid (pictured above) and his new party Yesh Atid (יש עתיד, ‘There is a Future’) have performed significantly better than expected, making it the second-largest party in the Knesset (הכנסת), Israeli’s unicameral parliament. As I wrote yesterday, [...]

A guide to the five likeliest Netanyahu-led governing coalitions for Israel

Polling in advance of tomorrow’s elections has been fairly steady for a month now in respect of the composition of the next Knesset (הכנסת), Israel’s unicameral parliament. Expectations, from day one of the campaign, have been nearly unanimous that prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu will remain as prime minister, but we still don’t know what the [...]

Fiscal, budget issues loom large in Israeli election

Shelly Yacimovich took over Israel’s Labor Party (מפלגת העבודה הישראלית) in 2011 with a clear message — she would focus on Israeli economic policy, wagering that Israeli voters would welcome a message that has more to do with jobs than jihad, that emphasize incomes over Iran.  After all, many elections have been won on the maxim of [...]

The Lebanonization of Israeli politics and next week’s Knesset elections

Daniel Levy, director of the Middle East and North Africa program at the European Council on Foreign Relations, has written in Foreign Policy what’s perhaps the best piece I’ve read in the U.S. media — or the Israeli media, for that matter — on next Tuesday’s upcoming Israeli elections, where he makes the point that Israeli politics [...]

Hagel’s Defense nomination may be about Israel — but not in the way you think

The next U.S. secretary of defense will affect world affairs in profound ways — the drawdown of troops from Afghanistan in 2013, the use of military drones to launch attacks on Yemen and Pakistan, and the ongoing strategic interest of U.S. armed forces in the Asia/Pacific theater.  It wasn’t pre-destined that the nomination of former U.S. senator [...]

Olmert’s break with Livni further fragments Israel’s center-left opposition

While Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu contemplates the rise of his former protégé-turned-rival Naftali Bennett, leader of the surging conservative Bayit Yehudi (הבית היהודי, ‘The Jewish Home’), he’s probably still not too worried about his chances to return as Israeli prime minister after January 22′s elections to the Knesset (הכנסת), Israel’s 120-seat unicameral parliament. That’s [...]

Lieberman resignation complicates Netanyahu coalition’s election chances

That Israel’s hard-line foreign minister Avigdor Lieberman will resign following indictments Thursday for breach of trust doesn’t mean he’s leaving politics. To the contrary, Lieberman’s move seems calculated to allow him to return to the forefront of Israel’s coalition government, headed by Benjamin Netanyahu, upon the strong likelihood that Netanyahu emerges from upcoming elections as prime [...]

What Barak’s apparent departure means for Israeli politics

Israeli defense minister — and prime minister from 1999 to 2001 — Ehud Barak announced earlier this week that he would not be contesting Israel’s Knesset elections on January 22.  Although he’ll stay on as defense minister until a new government is formed, Barak’s departure, at age 70, appears to end what has been a [...]

Today’s attack in Gaza and its effect on Israeli (and Middle Eastern) politics

First and foremost, it bears noting that civilians — including women and children — died today in Israel’s air strikes on Gaza and, whatever the merits, motivations or repercussions of that attack, our hearts — Jewish, Muslim, Christian, agnostic or otherwise — should cry for the loss of innocents in any military operation. One of [...]

About that 15-minute speech on misogyny by Australian PM Julia Gillard

New York tabloid blog Jezebel has officially awarded Australian prime minister Julia Gillard the title of ‘badass motherfucker,’ after Gillard spent 15 minutes in Australia’s House of Representatives on Tuesday calling out Coalition leader Tony Abbott for misogyny in the wake of a scandal that saw the House speaker resign after admitting to using inappropriate language [...]

Netanyahu announces early elections in Israel

Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu yesterday announced that he would call early elections for Israel’s unicameral legislature, the Knesset: In a televised statement, Netanyahu said  that, as his coalition government would not be able to agree on a national budget for 2013, he had “decided, for the benefit of Israel, to hold elections now and as [...]