Yisrael Beiteinu MKs Convert To Islam Rather Than Face Elections

Jerusalem, January 17 – The confluence of poor polling results and a swath of recently-emerged corruption allegations has prompted several prominent figures in the hard-line Yisrael Beiteinu party to embrace Islam rather than participate in upcoming elections with the party.

Six of the outgoing Members of Knesset from Yisrael Beiteinu traveled to Turkey last week and formally underwent conversion at a Madrassa there. The move comes amid investigations that have implicated several high-ranking figures in the party, and is apparently calculated to put the kibosh on inquiries as to whether those MKs intend to stand for reelection in March.

Yisrael Beiteinu, often described as “far right” in international media, advocates an uncompromising stance on security issues, and its leadership, especially its leader, Foreign Minister Avigdor Liberman, has been accused of naked racism. Liberman himself emerged unscathed – and, some would say, politically strengthened – two years ago after a corruption investigation against him was closed for lack of evidence. In the interim, however, the party has suffered a decline in the polls amid conflict with its coalition partners over social policy and religion-State issues. The six MKs told reporters they had decided to place themselves beyond the party’s pale by accepting Mohammed as Allah’s prophet and thus to rule out any possibility that the party’s electorate would consider them anyway.

Liberman led his party to electoral achievement in the 2013 elections in a partnership with Likud, but the marriage soured, and now Yisrael Beiteinu faces an election in which most polls foresee at most seven seats coming their way – a sharp decline from the eleven they currently hold, and the fifteen they garnered in the 2009 elections. Liberman himself remains unimplicated in the current round of swirling corruption allegations, but still faces condemnation from the political left for positions widely considered anti-Arab. It is that image that the departing MKs seek to exploit by burning any bridges that might otherwise threaten them.

On Thursday, the minister unveiled the party’s campaign slogan: “Ariel for Israel; Umm el-Fahm for Palestine.” The slogan conveys a platform that many see as dangerously close to advocating actual population transfer, a notion with dark associations for Jews. Nevertheless, the peril that Yisrael Beiteinu sees in the growing Palestinian population on both sides of the Green Line might outweigh any such misgivings, or so the party seems to be gambling. The six, however, want no part of such a gamble, or of the seemingly inevitable investigations that will embarrass them out of office if they seek to maintain their positions.

At press time, officials investigating a massive corruption case at the Israel Lands Administration were telling reporters they were making inquiries into allegations that the six departing MKs would be deeded properties in Umm el-Fahm if the latter were indeed transferred to the emerging State of Palestine.