At the 37th World Zionist Congress, scheduled to convene on October 20, everyone will wear nicely tailored suits and talk about the state of the Jewish people and its need for unity. This follows two months of secret political negotiations, coalitions that were silently formed and broken up, and street fighting between political wheeler-dealers in the parties over the big distribution of jobs. We'll finally know who will be the Jewish National Fund (JNF) chairman, who will chair the Zionist General Council, who will be in the Jewish Agency, and who will be chairman of the Keren Hayesod (United Israel Appeal) - momentous questions for the future of the Jewish people.
The big battle, of course, will be for the position of JNF chairman, and will begin tomorrow with a vote by the members of the Labor Party faction on its candidate for chairman (and the candidates for the 37 directors). Likud representative Natan Sharansky still has two years to go of his term as Jewish Agency chairman, so that job is off the agenda. Keren Hayesod chairman former MK Eliezer Zandberg is a Likud appointee, and is believed to have Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's support for another term, although in the current state of the Likud, it may prove more urgent to reserve the job for someone else, forcing Zandberg back into anonymity. The head of the World Zionist Organization, which operates the settlement division favored by the right wing and the settlers, will probably continue to be Habayit Hayehudi representative Avraham Duvdevani, who featured so prominently in the report by Talia Sasson about the Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria.
The leading candidate for JNF chairman is Efi Stenzler, who has occupied the position for eight years. The Labor Party faction has already announced that new stars are entering the picture: MKs Nachman Shai and Daniel Atar, and Yeruham Mayor Michael Biton. A surprising development in the battle over the chairmanship is the candidacy of former Yisrael Beitenu MK Uzi Landau. Landau regards himself as the representative of the right wing coalition, and he has recently been hovering around Minister of Finance Moshe Kahlon in search of his support, and to add Kulanu to a right wing coalition that can elect Landau JNF chairman, thereby depriving the left wing of any position of influence in the national institutions. JNF manages 2.5 million dunam (625,000 acres), mainly in central Israel. One million dunam (250,000 acres) were purchased with money donated by Jews all over the world, and the rest was given to JNF when large parcels of lands were expropriated after Israel became independent.
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on October 18, 2015
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