Corridors of Power: United they stand?

The Ashkenazi haredi camp is divided into three lists, and it is still unclear which mayoral candidate will receive the strongest backing.

By PEGGY CIDOR
Jerusalem Western Wall, Dome of the Rock 521 (photo credit: REUTERS)
Jerusalem Western Wall, Dome of the Rock 521
(photo credit: REUTERS)
There’s never a dull moment in the Holy City, especially these days, with elections coming up. For the first time in the history of modern haredi politics, multiple splits in this sector, usually renowned for its unity despite any internal conflict, are exploding the exterior appearance of togetherness. As these words are being written, it is still unclear how this phenomenon will end, but at the moment, there are no fewer than three Ashkenazi haredi lists registered for the October 22 city council elections – a situation never before seen in Jerusalem.
There are several explanations for this unprecedented state of affairs, but all agree that one of the underlying reasons is a decline in the unity of the sector’s leadership, at least compared to the way things were.
“It began with the death of Rabbi [Yosef Shalom] Elyashiv in August 2012,” explains a source from the community. “Officially, Rabbi Aharon Leib Shteinman is the new leader, but a small – and not negligible – group refuses to accept his supremacy and is gathered around Rabbi Shmuel Auerbach, establishing in fact two poles – one in Bnei Brak [Shteinman] and another in Jerusalem [Auerbach].”
In terms of local politics, the tensions manifest in essentially opposing attitudes toward the candidates for mayor. While the official United Torah Judaism Party, which includes members of both the Lithuanian and the hassidic haredi communities, openly supports the candidacy of Moshe Lion, Auerbach’s followers, represented in the new Bnei Torah party, refuse to support any candidate openly, but have issued a declaration stating that they would never vote in favor of someone (i.e., Lion) backed by Likud Beytenu MK Avigdor Liberman, the man who threatens the yeshiva world (through his bill to make military service mandatory for yeshiva students).
Meanwhile, internal tensions and conflicts exist not only between the Lithuanian factions, but also in the hassidic sector, where at least two of the larger courts – the Gur and the Belz hassidim – are sitting on the fence, refusing for the moment to confirm whether they will vote for Lion as per UTJ’s official position. As such, it is noteworthy that at least until now, about 10 days before the elections, the haredi sector has not delivered the “real goods” – meaning that Lion and his supporters (a few of them from the haredi community) have not achieved an official agreement with the haredi leadership, but only a blessing for success.
It is true, of course, that incumbent Mayor Nir Barkat hasn’t even obtained that, and probably won’t get any blessing from Shteinman, but Lion still does not have in hand a clear and precise order from the rabbis to vote for him. This is an important issue, since in the haredi “code,” there is a difference between an agreement – necessarily followed by instructions for haredi residents to vote as one for the candidate the rabbis have chosen – and a personal blessing, which indicates some sympathy but does not entail any obligation. In other words, despite expressing several times during his campaign that he has a high level of confidence in his ability to rally the haredim around him, Lion has not succeeded in bending the haredi leadership in his favor.
And Barkat? Well, the focus there is to try to achieve a tacit understanding with the Gur and Belz communities that they will vote for him, or at least not vote for Lion.
If that happens – and since the Gur sect did vote for him in 2008, it is not an unlikely scenario – not only will Barkat be reelected, but his Ashkenazi haredi deputy Yitzhak Pindrus might become the scapegoat of his own community. Pindrus is one of the architects of Lion’s candidacy – he was the first who approached him and his “patron” Arye Deri (Shas) – and if his plan to replace Barkat with a mayor more attentive to the haredi community’s needs fails, it may seriously affect his status. Pindrus is aware of the risks he is taking, and he knows that his fiercest opponents in his own party are aware of these risks as well.
A third movement, Tov, which appeared around the Knesset elections in January and represents haredim who work for a living and do not study full-time in yeshiva, is also participating in the elections, separately from UTJ.
The list’s leader, Hanoch Verdiger, and his No. 2, Yehezkel Rosenblum – who expect up to three seats on the council – have so far refused to say which of the two candidates they will support, thereby adding to the drama.