How many English-speaking MKs will make it through next elections?
None of the Anglo MKs can be certain they will be in the 21st Knesset, which might not end up having an MK born in an English speaking country.
By GIL HOFFMANUpdated: DECEMBER 27, 2018 00:40Michael Oren, former ambassador to the US, speaking infront of Christians United for Israel. (photo credit: REUTERS)
The 20th Knesset featured a record number of North American MKs, with US-born Michael Oren (Kulanu) and Yehudah Glick (Likud) and Canadian Sharren Haskel (Likud), who came on aliyah from Toronto as a one-year-old baby and later lived in Australia for six years.There was also Kulanu MK Rachel Azaria, who had US citizenship despite being born in Jerusalem, thanks to her American mother. Likud MK Yoav Kisch also gave up his British citizenship before entering the Knesset, as required of dual-citizen MKs by the 1958 Basic Law: The Knesset.None of the Anglo MKs can be certain they will be in the 21st Knesset, which might not end up having an MK born in an English-speaking country.Oren said he is undecided about whether to run again. Azaria gave a cryptic answer about developments in her party and declined to speak about whether Kulanu leader Moshe Kahlon wants her back.Glick, Kisch and Haskel will face a tough time in the Likud primary, where all the current ministers and MKs must run for a limited number of slots, because so many on the list are reserved for newcomers.Haskel, whose father will come from Toronto to help her campaign, may have an easier time, because there are slots reserved for women.Other MKs with connections to English-speaking Diaspora Jewry include Zionist Union MKs Nachman Shai, who is a former chairman of the Jewish Federations of North America, and Yael Cohen Paran, who runs a Conservative synagogue on Shabbat.Cohen Paran, who is part of the Hatnua Party that makes up the Zionist Union along with Labor, said she is building on the support of her political patron Tzipi Livni. To return to the Knesset, Shai would have to win one of the few slots available on the Labor list. The party is faring poorly in the polls and has many reserved slots that are taken.“I am running, I am running,” Shai said, resulting in his interlocutor responding: “into a firing squad.”
