by David Tesler
Constitution Building and
the Supreme Court
The following are some quick ideas and thoughts to aid in the teaching
of the Knesset and Israeli political life in light of the upcoming Knesset
elections.
Prerequisite: Prior to beginning, it is important that the
students learn about each individual party. Most of the main parties have
web sites or other information about the party available in English. A source sheet about each
party should be compiled and given to each student. If you choose an idea
(see below) where a student must represent a party, additional information
could be made available to the student to better understand the party.
Some suggestions of activities:
Current Events - It always
struck me that current Israeli politics is really Jewish history, albeit very
modern Jewish History. Yet, most students in day schools could not name
more than the current prime minister and his party of affiliation (if
that). I always thought it was silly that there was little attention
given to current events (taught in a meaningful manner, not just mentioned -
but understood in a real way) in Israel. You have everything you could
ever want to teach the material - a tremendous amount of source material, as
much audio and visual aid as you desire, daily updates and a chance for the
students to think meaningfully about what direction Jewish history should
take. I understand the value of teaching actual Jewish history (and I
would never argue that this should replace such a course) but I do think that
if the student's interest is piqued about current Israeli history, it will have
an effect in how they learn and respond to material about the past.
Budgeting- This is an effective way to
learn about the Knesset - it is essentially a classic value clarification
game - hence, there are many versions of how this could be played. The
basic gist of the game is that the moderator picks an annual budget and depending
on the age of the participants creates a number of issues/causes/priorities
that the participants must allocate the funds between. Ideally the topics would
be "hot button" issues like the peace process, protection of
settlements, religious/secular divide, Haredi yeshiva/family support/army
evasion, Israeli Arabs, Constitution, "Who is a Jew", etc. This could
be done in several ways and in several stages. Some examples:
A. Initial Stage - students debate among themselves where they feel the
money should go based upon their opinions, current knowledge and value system.
B. Intermediate Stage - Once the students understand the political system,
assign each student a party and have them represent the interests according to
"their party's" philosophy. (You could even call the students
by the names of the party leaders so that they begin to learn the important
players).
C. Advanced Stage - Have the students then understand that even after one
understands the positions of the various parties on all the "hot
button" issues, there are additional considerations such as leverage,
threatening to break the coalition, bringing down the government, no confidence
votes, personal pride issues, fear of government falling, following party
lines,relations with the U.S. government etc.
Single Issue- Have a
Knesset debate about ONE of the hot button issues mentioned above. Have
"expert" witnesses come in and testify as to the state of facts,
formulate how "your" party (the party to which each group is
assigned) would react to the proposed Knesset action. Instead of the
budgeting game, this would use one issue as a microcosm of how to understand
the Knesset. I would start out with the peace process. If
successful, upon completion (this would take months to play itself out, not
days or weeks) an additional issue could be used - like the
religious/secular divide. This could also be made into a year long
program, where students are assigned parties, make presentations to the rest of
the class about "what they stand for", argue about the correct
diplomatic and/or military response should be, have cabinet meetings, Knesset
votes, cabinet meetings, kitchen cabinet meetings etc. Current events
should be an integral part of class.
Knesset in History- This would
be a monumental task in America – but Israel is such a young State that
starting from its beginning could give students perspective that would make the
current parties/state of affairs easier to understand and "stick"
more in their minds. Once you understand the early years of Labor,
Begin's defeat of Labor etc., current Israeli politics becomes even more
understandable. You could either teach this in the "normal" way one
teaches history, or weave one issue (like the security issue) throughout the
political history of the State (i.e. Sharon was once a member of a Dovish
party, Begin bombed Iraq, national unity government days before the Six Day War
etc.).
Coalition Building- Once the
students learn about all the parties and the major players, an activity of
coalition building could be played. The premise is to mimic the infamous
wheeling and dealing that occurs immediately following the general elections
and preceding the establishment of a government. This could be played in many
different ways, but perhaps the best would be the teacher being the prime
minister and the students would be the parties that the prime minister would
have to woo. Election results could mirror the actual results from the
election or could be rigged to make the process of establishing a government
more difficult. Let's assume that Sharon wins the elections, should he
establish a far right government, centrist government, national unity
government - what are the assumptions and implications of each?
I am the Prime Minister- This
activity/game could be very interesting and would be as successful as the
teacher is creative. The premise is that the class is the Prime Minister
in an ongoing teaching exercise. The exercise could begin now (assuming you
want to bet on the favored candidate winning the elections) and would have to
make decisions about campaigning strategy, coalition building, choosing
ministers and then managing the government, managing crisis etc. This
activity is like the single-issue idea mentioned above, except that it focuses
on a single individual. There is a lot of potential here - there are
several books in English on Sharon, so the students could read select chapters
about him and really "get to know him". They could learn so
much about the government and the give and take of Israeli politics (should
Sharon keep Netanyahu at a distance or bring him close, should he try to form a
coalition government, even if unnecessary, should he bring in the religious
parties? at what cost? should his son continue to act as an advisor, how does
his personal history affect his decision making? How about the legacy that he
chooses to bequeath?) There is a fascinating article in the recent Azure
that gives a very detailed account of the weeks leading up to the Six Day War
and the maneuverings of then Prime Minister Eshkol - such reading would give
the students great insight into what a Prime Ministers job is like during a
crisis. Again, the source material is endless.
Constitution Building and the Supreme Court- This may be
too advanced for anyone except perhaps high school juniors or seniors - but it
could be a fascinating project. Israel has a series of basic laws that
have quasi constitutional status, an aggressive activist Supreme Court and some
murmuring about finally getting serious and developing on a Constitution.
Perhaps in conjunction with a course or project about the American
Constitution, have the students write a constitution for the State of
Israel. This would be a wonderful senior elective course – that could use
the US Constitution and the Federalist papers as a springboard to think about
constitution writing and then try to use those lessons for Israel's
constitution. This may sound too advanced, but it could be done with the
right class.