Israeli legislative election, 1951

Last updated April 10, 2019

Bedouin man votes BeduinElect51.jpg — Bedouin man votes

Elections for the second Knesset were held in Israel on 30 July 1951. Voter turnout was 75.1%.^[1]

Elections in Israel are based on nationwide proportional representation. The electoral threshold is currently set at 3.25%, with the number of seats a party receives in the Knesset being proportional to the number of votes it receives. The Knesset is elected for a four-year term, although most governments have not served a full term and early elections are a frequent occurrence. Israel has a multi-party system based on coalition governments as no party has ever won a majority of seats in a national election, although the Alignment briefly held a majority following its formation by an alliance of several different parties prior to the 1969 elections. The legal voting age for Israeli citizens is 18. Elections are overseen by the Central Elections Committee and are held according to the Knesset Elections Law.

Israel, officially the State of Israel, is a country in Western Asia, located on the southeastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea and the northern shore of the Red Sea. It has land borders with Lebanon to the north, Syria to the northeast, Jordan on the east, the Palestinian territories of the West Bank and Gaza Strip to the east and west, respectively, and Egypt to the southwest. The country contains geographically diverse features within its relatively small area. Israel's economic and technological center is Tel Aviv, while its seat of government and proclaimed capital is Jerusalem, although the state's sovereignty over Jerusalem has only partial recognition.

Results

Party	Votes	%	Seats	+/−
Mapai ¹	256,456	37.3	45	−1
General Zionists ²	111,394	16.2	20	+13
Mapam ¹	86,095	12.5	15	−4
Hapoel HaMizrachi	46,347	6.8	8	+1
Herut	45,651	6.6	8	−6
Maki ¹	27,334	4.0	5	+1
Progressive Party	22,171	3.2	4	−1
Democratic List for Israeli Arabs	16,370	2.0	3	New
Agudat Yisrael	13,799	2.0	3	+1
Sephardim and Oriental Communities ²	12,002	1.8	2	−2
Poalei Agudat Yisrael	11,194	1.6	2	−1
Mizrachi	10,383	1.5	2	−2
Progress and Work	8,067	1.2	1	New
Yemenite Association	7,965	1.2	1	0
Agriculture and Development	7,851	1.1	1	New

Sepharadim-Ashkenazim Unity	4,038	0.6	0	New
For New Immigrants and Freed Soldiers	375	0.1	0	New
Invalid/blank votes	7,515	–	–	–
Total	695,007	100	120	0
Source: Nohlen et al.

¹ Rostam Bastuni, Avraham Berman and Moshe Sneh left Mapam and set up the Left Faction. Bastuni later returned to Mapam whilst Berman and Sneh joined Maki. Hannah Lamdan and David Livschitz left Mapam and set up the Faction independent of Ahdut HaAvoda before joining Mapai. Four other members left Mapam to found Ahdut HaAvoda – Poale Zion, but the move was not recognised by the Knesset speaker.

Rostam Bastuni was an Israeli politician and journalist, and the first Israeli Arab to represent a Zionist party in the Knesset.

Moshe Sneh was a Haganah commander and an Israeli politician. One of the founders of Mapam, he later joined the Israeli Communist Party (Maki).

The Left Faction was a short-lived political party in Israel.

² Sephardim and Oriental Communities joined the General Zionists.

The Second Knesset

The second Knesset was highly unstable, with four separate governments and two different Prime Ministers. As with the first Knesset, the speaker was Yosef Sprinzak.

The Prime Minister of Israel is the head of government and chief executive of Israel.

Yosef Sprinzak was a leading Zionist activist in the first half of the 20th century, an Israeli politician, and the first Speaker of the Knesset, a role he held from 1949 until his death in 1959.

Third government

The second Knesset started with David Ben-Gurion forming the third government of Israel (the first Knesset had two governments) on 8 October 1951. His Mapai party formed a coalition with Mizrachi, Hapoel HaMizrachi, Agudat Yisrael, Agudat Yisrael Workers and the three Israeli Arab parties, the Democratic List for Israeli Arabs, Progress and Work and Agriculture and Development. Like the first Knesset, there were 15 ministers. The government resigned on 19 December 1952 due to a dispute with the religious parties over religious education.

David Ben-Gurion was the primary national founder of the State of Israel and the first Prime Minister of Israel.

In secular usage, religious education (RE) is the teaching of a particular religion and its varied aspects: its beliefs, doctrines, rituals, customs, rites, and personal roles. In Western and secular culture, religious education implies a type of education which is largely separate from academia, and which (generally) regards religious belief as a fundamental tenet and operating modality, as well as a prerequisite for attendance.

Fourth government

Ben-Gurion formed the fourth government on 24 December 1952, dropping the ultra-orthodox parties (Agudat Yisrael and Agudat Yisrael Workers) and replacing them with the General Zionists and the Progressive Party. The new government had 16 ministers. Ben-Gurion resigned on 6 December 1953 as he wished to settle in the Negev kibbutz of Sde Boker.

Haredi Judaism is a broad spectrum of groups within Orthodox Judaism, all characterized by a rejection of modern secular culture. Its members are often referred to as strictly Orthodox or ultra-Orthodox in English, although the term "ultra-Orthodox" is considered pejorative by many of its adherents. Haredim regard themselves as the most religiously authentic group of Jews, although this claim is contested by other streams.

The Negev is a desert and semidesert region of southern Israel. The region's largest city and administrative capital is Beersheba, in the north. At its southern end is the Gulf of Aqaba and the resort city of Eilat. It contains several development towns, including Dimona, Arad and Mitzpe Ramon, as well as a number of small Bedouin cities, including Rahat and Tel as-Sabi and Lakyah. There are also several kibbutzim, including Revivim and Sde Boker; the latter became the home of Israel's first Prime Minister, David Ben-Gurion, after his retirement from politics.

A kibbutz is a collective community in Israel that was traditionally based on agriculture. The first kibbutz, established in 1909, was Degania. Today, farming has been partly supplanted by other economic branches, including industrial plants and high-tech enterprises. Kibbutzim began as utopian communities, a combination of socialism and Zionism. In recent decades, some kibbutzim have been privatized and changes have been made in the communal lifestyle. A member of a kibbutz is called a kibbutznik.

Fifth government

Moshe Sharett formed the fifth government on 26 January 1954 with the same coalition partners and ministers. Sharett resigned on 29 June 1955, when the General Zionists refused to abstain from voting on a motion of no-confidence brought by Herut and Maki over the government's position on the trial of Malchiel Gruenwald, who had accused Rudolf Kastner of collaborating with the Nazis.

Moshe Sharett was the second Prime Minister of Israel (1954–55), serving for a little under two years between David Ben-Gurion's two terms. He continued as Foreign Minister (1955–56) in the Mapai government.

A motion of no-confidence, alternatively vote of no confidence, or (unsuccessful) confidence motion, is a statement or vote which states that a person in a position of responsibility is no longer deemed fit to hold that position, perhaps because they are inadequate in some respect, are failing to carry out obligations, or are making decisions that other members feel detrimental. As a parliamentary motion, it demonstrates to the head of state that the elected parliament no longer has confidence in the appointed government. If a no confidence motion is passed against an individual minister they have to give their resignation along with the entire council of ministers.

Malchiel Gruenwald (1882–1958) was an Israeli hotelier, amateur journalist and stamp collector, who came to public attention in 1953, when he accused an Israeli government employee, Rudolf Kastner, of having collaborated with the Nazis during the Holocaust.

Sixth government

Sharett formed the sixth government on 29 June 1955, eliminating the General Zionists and the Progressive Party from the coalition and reducing the number of ministers to 12. The new government did not last long, as a general election was called for 26 July 1955.

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The thirteenth government of Israel was formed by Levi Eshkol on 12 January 1966, following the November 1965 elections. His coalition included the Alignment, the National Religious Party, Mapam, the Independent Liberals, Poalei Agudat Yisrael, Progress and Development and Cooperation and Brotherhood, and had eighteen ministers.

Mapam was a left-wing political party in Israel. The party is one of the ancestors of the modern-day Meretz party.

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References

↑ Dieter Nohlen, Florian Grotz & Christof Hartmann (2001) Elections in Asia: A data handbook, Volume I, p123 ISBN 0-19-924958-X

External links

Historical overview of the Second Knesset Knesset website
Knesset Elections Results: Second Knesset Knesset website
Factional and Government Make-Up of the Second Knesset Knesset website

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[1] Dieter Nohlen, Florian Grotz & Christof Hartmann (2001) Elections in Asia: A data handbook, Volume I, p123 ISBN 0-19-924958-X

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