The 23rd Knesset, the new and the old

The incoming Knesset is not very different from the outgoing, as 112 MKs will continue to serve.

By YAIR ASSAF-SHAPIRA
An empty Knesset Plenum (photo credit: MARC ISRAEL SELLEM/THE JERUSALEM POST)
An empty Knesset Plenum
(photo credit: MARC ISRAEL SELLEM/THE JERUSALEM POST)
Just before the inauguration of the incoming members of the 23rd Knesset, we took a final demographic view of the outgoing members of the Knesset.
The youngest member of the 22nd Knesset, according to the Knesset website, is Blue and White MK Yorai Lahav-Hertzano, born in 1988. There are 12 MKs in the 30 to 39 age group of numbers – exactly 10% of the MKs in the house.
The oldest member is MK Yael Garman, also from Blue and White, who was born in 1947. The 70 and over age group of consists of five MKs, or about 4% of the members.
Most Members of the Knesset (103 members, or about 86%) are in the 40 to 69 age group. For the sake of comparison, this age group constitutes a lower percentage in the Israeli population, where it amounts only to 58% of the people aged 30 years old or over. The median age in the Knesset, or the age that half of the members are younger than, and half older, is 53.
There are 28 women MKs serving in the 22nd Knesset, about 23% of the legislators. This is fewer than the number in the two preceding Knesset terms, but more than any of the terms prior to those, and in any case, far below the proportion of women in the population. The proportion of women MKs is not much different from the proportion MPs worldwide, which according to the Inter-Parliamentary Union, stands at about 25%.
What about the 23rd Knesset? The incoming Knesset is not very different from the outgoing, as 112 MKs will continue to serve. It includes 30 women, a slight change in the right direction, after two women MKs left, and four new ones were elected, two of whom between the ages of 30 and 35, and two between 55 and 60. The six men leaving the Knesset include MK Lahav-Hertzano, but four of them are over the age of 60.
It is interesting to note that the age breakdown among women MKs is different from that of men in both Knesset terms. There are mostly younger Knesset members among women; the dominant age bracket for female MKs is 40 to 49, whereas among men the dominant age group is 60 to 69. The different age structure may be indicative of discrimination, it may stem from a natural process, or it may be just coincidence.