The Last Lap of the Jerusalem Mayoral Race

Another major election is happening in Israel tomorrow; Mayor of Jerusalem.  Campaigners are out everyday with banners and hand outs to promote candidates.  This election will play a large roll in determining the future the poorest city in Israel.  With many of the city’s secular residents leaving due to the lack of economic opportunity, high housing costs and segregated neighborhoods (secular, religious and Arab), the elections will be symptomatic of the changing population.

The secular Jewish middle class is one of the populations being hardest hit by the struggle between populations.  They feel the pull of better jobs and the push of high housing costs forcing them out of the capital.  The average Jewish income in Jerusalem is $16,000 annually compared to $24,000 in the Tel Aviv area – and just $4,000 among Arab residents of eastern Jerusalem.  In addition, the cost of living in Jerusalem has sky rocketed in recent years.  One of the causes is Diaspora Jews that are paying exorbitant prices to own apartments in the city to only stay there for a few weeks a year.  The problem with the middle class leaving, however, is that they are the ones with the necessary jobs.  They pay taxes and are self sustaining where many other segments of the population are not.

Nir Barkat seems to be the choice for this group.  He is 49 year old secular Jerusalemite who made a fortune pioneering anti-virus software in the 1990s.  Barkat advocates reviving the city and its economy by focusing on tourism and making Jerusalem a world-class center for medicine and life sciences.

His chances of winning are slim, however, because many people in the middle class have simply given up.  Only a small percentage of them come to the polls compared to the droves of the orthodox population that will go to vote for the other leading candidate, Rabbi Meir Porush, a seventh-generation Jerusalemite and longtime fixture on Israel’s Orthodox political scene.  Rabbis from this comunity will implore their congregations to vote as a calling from G-d; a calling that is not heard by many other parts of the population.  In fact the majority of Arab Israelis have already refused to vote.

Porush sees the demographics of the city’s population as the biggest problem that the city is currently facing.  Right now, 66% of residents are Jewish, which he declared is “an emergency situation.” 
The third candidate is billionaire Arcadi Gaydamak, who claims that he is the voice of the people.  Gaydamak’s past includes an international arrest warrant for allegedly illicit arms dealing in Angola and paying out of his own pocket to house Israelis fleeing the rocket fire in the North during the 2006 Lebanon war.
Each of these candidates will take the city in very different directions.  This decision won’t just affect the residents, but Jerusalem’s reputation as a hub for all three of the world’s monotheistic religions.