Today marks the start of the official media campaigns of the parties running for Knesset in the upcoming elections. In Israel, election campaign advertisements on television and radio are limited to fixed hours during the day for the period leading up to the election. Campaign propaganda on radio or TV outside of those set-aside times is strictly forbidden by law. The amount of time allocated to a party is dependent on the size of its representation in the outgoing parliament, with a fixed minimum time for new parties. Israel Radio broadcasts the political advertisements three times throughout the day, and on television, the advertisements will be broadcast for an hour long bloc during prime-time, on three different stations.
The campaign jingle of the right-wing Herut party was disqualified today by the Elections Committee, for “fear that it borders on incitement.” However, committee chairman Justice Mishael Cheshin allowed the broadcast of the jingle on a one-time basis, and in a limited format, during tonight’s bloc of political advertising. The Herut jingle is a spoof of the Israeli national anthem, Hatikva, with Arabic nationalist slogans and chants replacing the standard words. Among other things, the spoof includes the words “Biladi, Biladi” (regarded as the anthem of the PLO), “expel the Jews” (changed from “slaughter the Jews”), and a voice-over calling out “Allah hu akbar!” Ironically, it was Herut leader Michael Kleiner who initiated and tabled a bill in the outgoing Knesset that would have given legal protection to the national anthem.
The campaign jingle of the right-wing Herut party was disqualified today by the Elections Committee, for “fear that it borders on incitement.” However, committee chairman Justice Mishael Cheshin allowed the broadcast of the jingle on a one-time basis, and in a limited format, during tonight’s bloc of political advertising. The Herut jingle is a spoof of the Israeli national anthem, Hatikva, with Arabic nationalist slogans and chants replacing the standard words. Among other things, the spoof includes the words “Biladi, Biladi” (regarded as the anthem of the PLO), “expel the Jews” (changed from “slaughter the Jews”), and a voice-over calling out “Allah hu akbar!” Ironically, it was Herut leader Michael Kleiner who initiated and tabled a bill in the outgoing Knesset that would have given legal protection to the national anthem.