Ahead of next month’s election, the New Pensioners Party, also named Dor
Builders of the Land, launched its election campaign on Sunday at a press
conference in Tel Aviv.
The presentation led by the slogan “Because we
need to take care of mom and dad,” started with a short video clip in which old
family photos of parents with their children scroll across the screen
accompanied by a voice saying: “They held us in their arms; were there for our
first step; taught us to deal with challenges; were full of pride when we grew
up; and gave us a shoulder to lean on during the most difficult
moments.
“They took care of us our whole life, now it is our turn,” the
video continued.
The party declared that its goal is to appeal to the
younger generation, who are between 30 and 40 years old, to rally them to the
cause as they think of their parents or any other elderly member of their
family.
Party chairman Ephraim Lapid, who opened the conference,
explained that Dor (meaning “generation”) decided to symbolically launch its
political crusade on Sunday, 10 Tevet, which marks a memorial day for Holocaust
victims whose date of death remains unknown.
“Dor is the only social
party in Israel,” Lapid said, “Everybody, from Left, Right or Center will tell
you about social justice, about Iran’s nuclear weapons or about peace with
Syria, but no one will put the four subjects which we are committed to on top of
their agendas.”
The four subjects are the health system, old-age
pensions, the right to retire with dignity and housing.
According to Dor,
there are 804,000 citizens aged 65 or older living in Israel today, which
represents one out of 10 individuals. Fourteen percent continue to work after
retirement age.
“We are very proud to be the voice of those who want to
continue to live in dignity and contribute to Israeli society,” Lapid
added.
The issue of retirement, which Dor sees as “a forgotten field,”
was presented as central to the party’s political vision.
In Israel
today, individuals are required to retire at age 67, but social worker Dalia
Nakar, who has joined the party, believes this law ought to be
changed.
“These are still young people,” she said, “Sixty-seven years old
today is not the 67 years old of 30 or 40 years ago, when the individual only
had another couple of years to live and was indeed very old by then.
“We
want to change this law and have people retire out of right and not obligation,
because we believe that the elderly can still contribute in many ways,” Nakar
continued.
As far as the health system in concerned, Midad Gissin, the
party’s No. 2, who suffered from cancer 25 years ago, explained the party sees a
need to change the current health system, expanding the funds given to the
elderly for medical expenses “so that they don’t have to choose between eating
and buying medicine.”
“No other party brought up the health issue,”
Gissin said, “but health is the only issue that really concerns everyone,
regardless of color, race, age or religion, everyone is faced with the health
issue and whoever hasn’t been sick yet will be.”
Dor is expected to start
spreading its new campaign on social media in the next few days.
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