The newly elected Knesset sees the highest number of legislators coming from the Zionist faith division in Israeli society, in numbers that exceed the size of the population.
They represent several political parties that surround the Knesset including Likud, Yamina, Blue & White, Yesh Atid and the New Hope Party.
Religious Zionist voters backed several parties on Election Day. Some voted for an ultra-rectangular Englishman and others for Labor, with a small number casting their ballots for the Torah United Jewish party.
But the emblem of Zionist religious voters has been opposed by one party and has become a code name for racism, deception and religious terrorism.
The racist Itamar Ben-Gvir joined Bezalel Smotrich and others to form a Zionist Religious alliance. He took about 2.5 seats as his dowry. Smotrich was targeting Haredi’s young voters and added perhaps one more chair.
But it was Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu who campaigned for the new alliance, carrying it over the lowest threshold into the Knesset, bringing homophobic, sexist extremists into the legislature.
Most religious Zionists are not terribly religious in their views. Indeed, over the last few years there has been a shift in the perception of the role of women in society and their LGBT members, which are increasingly accepted.
Unfortunately, many values held by this section of the population over the centuries are now discarded. Loyalty, caring for strangers and sympathy for victims of abuse are all neglected in the name of the settlement movement.
After Israel withdrew from the Gaza Strip in 2005, destroying Jewish settlements in a tragic event, the importance of the “Land of Israel” became extremely important – even if it meant the apology of several sins.
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Soldiers remove young settlers from their homes as part of Israel’s withdrawal from the Gaza Strip in 2005
(Photo: Avi Moalem)
The importance of the settlement movement was the impetus behind the religious Zionists’ refusal to support Naftali Bennett and his Yamina party during Tuesday’s election. Bennett – rightly or wrongly – was thought to be preparing to join the left-leaning bloc that opposes the West Bank settlement.
Whether their vote was strategic or emotional, the most religious Zionist voters are moderate people. But their ballots indicate that something deeper is happening.
Haredi settlers, those who claim zealotry not only in their views of settlements but also in their religious practice, have displayed a power that is out of proportion to their numbers in the community. Zionist religion.
This power has more than this power. These people are changing the education systems of the region, youth movements and religious institutions.
Although the first generation of the settlers was made up of moderately religious people, children growing up in cities today are taught in a different and much longer form of Judaism and religious practice.
Every Zionist religious family has at least one member either in a settlement or elsewhere today who is part of the LGBT community or another member who has become secular.
Religious young men and women are now left single into their 30s, unlike their predecessors, and there is less tolerance for domestic or sexual violence.
But Smotrich wants to change that. He says living without marriage is wrong and promises to make a law that would make protests against sexual harassment much more difficult.
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Spiritual leader of the homamobic movement Noam Zvi Yisrael Thau will attend a pro-Netanyahu demonstration in Tel Aviv in 2019
(Photo: Moti Kimchi)
The Zionist Religious Alliance opposes any religious and state-led media campaigns, and its Noam group has already announced that it will wage war on LGBT Israelis and feminism.
Conflict with the prevailing values of the community will come sooner rather than later and this new repetitive philosophy will only control the push of more religious Zionists into worldly life.
Even if you get the wind blowing, that’s probably not a bad thing.