Labor continued its efforts to reach undecided voters on Monday, with party
leader Shelly Yacimovich taking the “swing vote bus” to Tel
Aviv.
Yacimovich, Labor MK Isaac Herzog, and venture capitalist and Labor
candidate Erel Margalit rode the bus through Ramat Hahayal, a neighborhood with
many high-tech offices, while workers were on their lunch break, to try to
convince them to vote Labor.
Labor has had two “swing vote buses” visit
shopping centers and business areas around the country for the past two weeks,
and plans to rent six more buses to drive voters to polling places on
Tuesday.
Speaking to campaign volunteers Monday night, Yacimovich said
three to four Knesset seats are being wasted by people who are not voting or
voting for parties too small to pass the election threshold.
According to
the party’s campaign, Labor activists visited 90,000 homes in recent weeks, and
hope to double the amount by Tuesday. In addition, activists called tens of
thousands of undecided voters.
In a press conference Monday morning,
party candidates attacked Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s economic
plans.
“Labor has a comprehensive plan, written in cooperation with
dozens of economists for building tens of thousands of homes on free land,
because the land is public, and the public deserves it,” Herzog said.
“Affordable housing, at NIS 600,000 for a young family is
possible.”
Labor candidate Itzik Shmuly, a leader of the 2011 tent
protests, said that “at the height of the protests, we spoke about social
justice as an inclusive concept for people who go to the army, the workforce,
pay taxes but feel their needs don’t matter.”
“This election is a major
opportunity. I am sure many Israelis woke up this morning and asked themselves
how they will pay their rent. We ask them to vote by this question.
Which
party will really bring solutions to the housing crisis and deal with
socioeconomic problems?” Shmuly asked.
Meanwhile, Labor continued to
recruit celebrity supporters, like rock star Aviv Geffen and popular novelist
Eshkol Nevo.
Unlike his “The Voice” costar Sarit Hadad, who sang “You’re
the Bomb” to Netanyahu, Geffen tweeted that “after much deliberation, I am going
with Shelly Yacimovich.
Somehow, I feel like she is the closest to the
light switch.” Yuval Banai, another “The Voice” mentor, announced he will be
voting Labor last week.
Nevo wrote that “long before social justice
brought thousands to town squares, Yacimovich demanded it on every stage, with
persistence that became her trademark...
This is a woman with a moral
spine and a proven ability to turn ideology into achievements.”
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