Israeli Activist Wants Christians Represented in Israel's Parliament
by Chad Groening
February 28, 2006
(AgapePress) - - A conservative Israeli activist notes that, thanks to immigration, the Christian population of Israel has grown to a politically significant percentage. That is why he wants to form a new political party to place Christian representatives in Israel's Parliament, the Knesset.Avi Lipkin is perhaps better known by his pen name, Victor Mordecai. The American-born Israeli author and lecturer has been back in the U.S. recently, telling American Christians about his desire to create the "Bible Bloc Party."
Christians have historically had no voice in Israel's primary legislative body, Lipkin points out. His "Bible Bloc" will be a party that "will have Christian activists and Christian candidates running for the Knesset ... because the Christian population in Israel has grown in the last 15 years from two percent to eight percent of Israel's voting population."
The author says he would have been able to get the Bible Bloc Party on the ballot for this year's elections, had it not been for certain political upheavals. "Because of the overthrow of Shimon Peres in the Labor Party, Amir Peretz took over the party [and] demanded ... the elections be moved up to March 28th of this year," he explains.
"That only gave me four months to get organized," Lipkin adds. "You cannot put together a political party in three or four months. This is something that requires many years." As a result of the elections being moved up, he says, the Bible Bloc Party will not be able to take part in next month's elections, but he hopes to see the party on the ballot in time for the following Knesset Assembly elections.
Right now, the Israeli conservative notes, Muslims represent 15 percent of Israel's population and have 12 members on the Knesset, while Christians are not represented in that government body at all. "The reason I'm forming this party is because Israel is a multi-party system," he says, and none of the parties in Israel have any kind of Christian representation."
Lipkin is working to correct this disparity. "Christians are serving the army, risking their lives on the battlefield alongside their Jewish brethren," he says. "It cannot be that eight percent of the population is not represented in the Knesset."
Allie Martin, a regular contributor to AgapePress, is a reporter for American Family Radio News, which can be heard online.
