If you live in a neighborhood with a lot of English speakers, don’t be surprised
if multiple parties approach you outside polling stations Tuesday in English and
seek your vote.
Parties from across the political spectrum will be
sending volunteers to polling stations in Jerusalem, Ra’anana, Modi’in, Netanya,
Beit Shemesh, and Gush Etzion. Some parties are even calling prospective voters
to see if they need assistance getting to polling stations.
Yesh Atid
leader Yair Lapid sent a letter to English-speaking voters on Sunday and also
released a video. In the letter, which had over 13,000 views on Facebook in half
a day, Lapid outlined his party platform and praised immigrants from English-
speaking countries.
“English-speakers are classically dreamers and
optimists who feel empowered to be part of the solution,” Lapid wrote. “That is
why Yesh Atid is your natural political home.”
Yesh Atid English campaign
director Dov Lipman said he had built up a list of 200 volunteers who he met at
his nightly parlor meetings who would be active on election day to get out the
vote. He held an event in Netanya on Sunday night with 250 people.
Lipman
said his party was bolstered in recent weeks by voters who shifted allegiance
from Bayit Yehudi after they decided the party was too right-wing for
them.
Recent polls showing the party rising also gave some people the
impression that Lipman, who is 17th on the list, could have an outside chance of
making it into the Knesset.
Bayit Yehudi English campaign manager Jeremy
Saltan revealed that despite the controversy over Atlanta-born Knesset candidate
Jeremy Gimpel’s comments on the Temple Mount, Gimpel held a successful event for
English speakers in Netanya on Saturday night.
Gimpel and Detroit-born
Chicago-raised Uri Bank, who is 19th on the list, divided up polling stations
where they will tour on election day. The party has hundreds of English-speaking
volunteers who signed up in the nightly parlor meetings held by Gimpel and
Bank.
Yisrael Beytenu has been doing its part to bring out the vote of
English speakers with nightly events featuring candidates Yair Shamir and Uzi
Landau and former MK Zvi Hendel and smaller parlor meetings run by party
officials.
Volunteers from Yisrael Beytenu have been manning booths in
English-speaking population centers since Wednesday, and they will continue
until polls close Tuesday night. The party also has the largest English online
presence.
The Likud, which is running together with Yisrael Beytenu, has
held several English-speaking events, including one Sunday night in Tel Aviv
with MK Tzipi Hotovely.
The Tzipi Livni Party sent out emails in English
on Sunday to attract last-minute support.
Livni will be meeting Sunday
with Reform and Conservative rabbis and representatives.
On election day,
American-born candidate Alon Tal and volunteers will tour polling stations in
English-speaking communities on bicycles.
The Central Election
Committee’s English hotline to help people find out where to vote is
1-800-200-135.
Yonah Jeremy Bob contributed to this report.