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      Netanyahu Offers Rival a Year in Office, in Last-Minute Bid for Government

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      With a deadline fast approaching, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel is still pushing to form a new coalition.JERUSALEM — Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel said on Monday that he would be willing to hand over leadership for one year to a longtime right-wing rival, Naftali Bennett, in a last-ditch effort to cobble together a new government.Mr. Netanyahu, who has spent the last 12 years in office and is now standing trial on corruption charges, announced the offer just ahead of a deadline to form a government, in the wake of Israel’s fourth inconclusive election in two years.The arrangement, part of a rotation agreement, would be a highly unusual one since Mr. Bennett, who served briefly as defense minister in a previous government, leads a small, pro-settlement party, Yamina, that holds just seven seats in the 120-seat Parliament.Mr. Netanyahu wrote about the offer in a post on Facebook less than 36 hours before his time to form a new government runs out at midnight on Tuesday. Mr. Bennett appeared to dismiss the offer as political spin in his initial response.The last election in March has left Mr. Netanyahu weakened and, so far, unable to muster a coalition that would command a parliamentary majority.Mr. Netanyahu’s conservative Likud party won the most seats of any party in the election, securing 30 seats in the 120-seat Parliament, but had been endorsed for the premiership by only 52 lawmakers from Likud, two loyal ultra-Orthodox parties and a far-right alliance called Religious Zionism.Even with Mr. Bennett’s Yamina on board, Mr. Netanyahu would still be two seats short of the 61 needed to form a majority government.Still, the support of Mr. Bennett’s party could be key, and he has been negotiating both with the Netanyahu-led bloc and with an opposition bloc made up of parties from across the spectrum that are determined to unseat Mr. Netanyahu. That group also had no easy path to power.A banner for Naftali Bennett and his Yamina party in Jerusalem ahead of last month’s elections.Ahmad Gharabli/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesMr. Netanyahu said Mr. Bennett had demanded to serve for one year in a rotating premiership while negotiating with both sides, playing each against the other.“It’s not exactly a routine demand from the person who heads a party with seven seats,” Mr. Netanyahu said of Mr. Bennett’s stipulation. “But the consideration that guides me is what is at stake now — the good of the country: A right-wing government and not a left-wing government.” Mr. Bennett subsequently denied having made the demand.If Mr. Bennett were to take up Mr. Netanyahu’s offer, it is unclear how much power Mr. Bennett would actually wield given the imbalance between their respective parties.Mr. Bennett has said he would prefer to sit in a coherent right-wing government but noted that he was waiting for Mr. Netanyahu to show he had a majority. His immediate response to Mr. Netanyahu’s offer was dismissive.“I have just heard Netanyahu’s proposal, and I have to say it is unclear to me,” Mr. Bennett said. “I did not demand the premiership from Netanyahu, but rather I asked for a government. And that, to my regret, he does not have.”In order to form a government, Mr. Netanyahu needs the direct or passive support of Raam, a small Islamist party whose Hebrew acronym stands for the United Arab List, which holds four seats in Parliament. But most of the Religious Zionism party has so far ruled out relying on the support of the Arab party, which they say supports terrorism.Mr. Netanyahu’s only other option is to attract defectors from the opposition bloc. Mr. Netanyahu said that if Mr. Bennett and his Yamina party joined forces to form a solid bloc of 59 seats, others would come.Mr. Bennett and Mr. Netanyahu during a meeting of the Israeli Parliament last year.Sebastian Scheiner/Associated PressThe latest power-sharing proposal could offer Israel a way out of its prolonged political deadlock. But even with Mr. Netanyahu in the background, it could highlight the cracks in his carefully curated image of indispensability.Mr. Netanyahu has presented himself as the only candidate qualified and experienced enough to secure Israel’s future in a volatile region, at a time when the Biden administration is pursuing negotiations aimed at restoring the 2015 nuclear agreement with Iran despite Israeli objections.But questions of trust and stability would hang over any new government with Mr. Bennett at least nominally at the helm, after a similar agreement lasted just months.Mr. Netanyahu’s last government was also based on a rotation agreement with his main coalition partner, Benny Gantz, the leader of the centrist Blue and White party. The two joined forces in a unity government after last year’s election draw.Mr. Netanyahu held the office of prime minister first, with the agreement that Mr. Gantz would take over in November 2021. But after only seven months, Mr. Netanyahu created a budget crisis that led to new elections, before Mr. Gantz could get close to heading the government.What many Israelis are hoping for now is an end to the gridlock that paralyzed the government for years. The political morass left Israel without a state budget for two consecutive years in the middle of a pandemic and has delayed appointments to several key administrative and judicial posts.Aside from the country’s usual tensions between secular and religious, right-wing and left-wing, and Jewish and Arab, the main division had increasingly focused on Mr. Netanyahu himself. Even the ideological right has been split between pro- and anti-Netanyahu camps, largely over the leader’s fitness for the office of prime minister amid his legal troubles.Mr. Netanyahu is expected to appear in court regularly now that the evidentiary stage of his trial on charges of bribery, fraud and breach of trust, which he denies, has begun. More

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      For Democrats, Another Bad Election Night in Texas

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      Two Republicans qualified for a runoff to fill a vacant House seat in northern Texas, foiling Democrats’ hopes of a breakthrough there.AUSTIN, Texas — Democrats hoping for some encouraging signs in Texas did not find any on Saturday in a special election to fill a vacant congressional seat. Instead, they found themselves locked out of a runoff that will now see two Republicans battle for the seat in northern Texas.The two Republicans — Susan Wright, who was endorsed by President Donald J. Trump, and State Representative Jake Ellzey — emerged as the top vote-getters in a 23-candidate, all-party special election to replace Mrs. Wright’s husband, U.S. Representative Ron Wright, who this year became the first congressman to die of Covid-19.Jana Lynne Sanchez, a Democrat who made a surprisingly strong showing for the seat in 2018 and was considered by many as a likely cinch for the runoff, came in a close third, leaving the two Republicans to fight for the seat that their party has controlled for nearly four decades.Democrats who needed a strong turnout to be competitive did not get one. They were hoping for signs of weakness in the Republican brand because of the state’s disastrous response to the brutal winter storm in February or any signs of weariness with Mr. Trump, but they did not see that, either.Michael Wood, a small-business man and Marine veteran who gained national attention as the only openly anti-Trump Republican in the field, picked up only 3 percent of the vote.Democrats have not won a statewide race in Texas since 1994. When the seat is filled, Texas’ house delegation will be 23 Republicans and 13 Democrats.“The Republicans turned out and the Democrats didn’t,” said Cal Jillson, a political science professor at Southern Methodist University in Dallas. “That’s a critical takeaway. The party has to think very systematically about what’s wrong and what they need to change in order to be successful.Since 1983, Republicans have held seat, in Texas’ Sixth Congressional District, which includes mostly rural areas in three northern Texas counties and a sliver of the nation’s fourth-largest metropolitan region around Dallas, Fort Worth and Arlington.But growing numbers of Hispanics and African-Americans fueled Democrats’ hopes that they had a strong shot of at least getting into a runoff. Mr. Trump won the district by only 3 points in November. Ms. Sanchez, who grew up in the district and built a strong political organization, was widely portrayed as the lead contender in the field of 10 Democrats.But in the end, she came up 354 votes short after the Democrats splintered the party’s vote, and Mr. Ellzey nudged her aside for the runoff. Mrs. Wright won 19.2 percent of the vote to Mr. Ellzey’s 13.8 percent. Ms. Sanchez got 13.4 percent of the vote.The large field may have cost Ms. Sanchez a runoff spot, but in the end Republicans won 62 percent of the vote and Democrats 37 percent, not auspicious numbers for her hopes of winning if she did get in the runoff.“Democrats have come a long way toward competing in Texas but we still have a way to go,” Ms. Sanchez said in a concession statement on Sunday morning.She said: “We’ll keep fighting for a healthier, equitable and prosperous Texas and to elect leaders who care about meeting the needs of Texans, although it won’t happen in this district immediately.”The Republican runoff was already showing signs of being fought along familiar right-of-center turf.Ms. Wright’s general consultant, Matt Langston, assailed Mr. Ellzey, a former Navy pilot who was endorsed by former Gov. Rick Perry, as “an opportunistic RINO” — a Republican in Name Only.And one of her prominent supporters, David McIntosh, president of the conservative Club for Growth, which has spent more than $350,000 on mail, social media and texts against Mr. Ellzey’s bid, on Sunday called on the second-place candidate to pull out of the race. He said it was more important for Republicans to unite behind Mrs. Wright’s candidacy in advance of the critical midterm congressional races next year.“If he wants to unite, stop attacking,” said Craig Murphy, Mr. Ellzey’s spokesman, firmly rebuffing Mr. McIntosh’s proposal. Mr. Murphy also denounced Mr. Langston’s statement against his candidate as “silly and insulting” and described Mr. Ellzey as “a guy who has been under enemy fire eight times.”The defeat in the special election in some respects evoked the 2020 elections in Texas, when Democrats believed that demographic changes put them in reach of a potential “blue wave” to possibly take over the Republican-controlled state House of Representatives and flip several congressional seats. Instead, the blue wave never washed ashore, and the House remains in Republicans hands by the same margin as before.The Sixth District was once a Democratic stronghold, until Phil Gramm, formerly a conservative Democrat, switched party affiliations in 1983. The district has been a reliable Republican bastion ever since.The seat came open in February after Mr. Wright, who had lung cancer, died after he contracted the coronavirus. His wife was an early front-runner to replace him, but her chances of outright victory narrowed after the field grew to 23 candidates: 11 Republicans, 10 Democrats, a Libertarian and an independent. More

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      Perú y la desolación final

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      La idea de una supuesta batalla final entre la izquierda y la derecha, ¿realmente ayuda a los peruanos a discernir y a decidir mejor por quién votarán el próximo 6 de junio?El escenario político del Perú, de cara a la segunda vuelta electoral, parece un libreto tan perfecto como aterrador. Si a un avezado guionista de televisión le hubieran encargado el diseño de un drama sin salidas posibles, tal vez no hubiera imaginado un relato tan desolador. La realidad no supera a la ficción: la sustituye. Después de la profunda crisis política que ha vivido el país —con cuatro presidentes en los últimos cinco años—, tener ahora que elegir entre Pedro Castillo y Keiko Fujimori parece una pesadilla inimaginable, el peor remake de la industria de la polarización latinoamericana.¿Acaso tiene sentido seguir tratando de analizar lo que ocurre en la región como si fuera, tan solo, parte de un único y casi mecánico enfrentamiento entre el capitalismo y el comunismo? Esta propuesta esquemática —donde convergen algunos escritores reconocidos y analistas internacionales— parece cada vez más inútil. No logra explicar la realidad. Tampoco ha logrado modificarla.Pensar que ahora, nuevamente, en el Perú, se produce un choque entre las fuerzas universales de la izquierda y la derecha; insistir en la idea de que nuestra historia reciente solo puede entenderse como una sucesión de conspiraciones entre supuestos socialistas y supuestos liberales, ya no aporta nada y, por el contrario, obvia o elude la complejidad de nuestras sociedades y del proceso que está viviendo el continente. Parecen simples fórmulas de postergación. Tras los múltiples incendios de la polarización, la tragedia de las grandes mayorías sigue igual, intacta.¿La idea de una supuesta batalla final entre la izquierda y la derecha, realmente ayuda a los peruanos a discernir y a decidir mejor por quién votarán el próximo 6 de junio?La consigna de Pedro Castillo, supuestamente en el extremo a la izquierda, no es nueva: “Solo el pueblo salvará al pueblo”. Forma parte de una retórica ambigua pero eficaz. Recita textos de uno de los intelectuales de la izquierda latinoamericana por antonomasia, Eduardo Galeano, y convoca al país rural, abandonado y muchas veces despreciado. Convierte el melodrama en una acción política. Sin ofrecer demasiadas claridades con respecto a su programa de gobierno, capitaliza las legítimas ansias de cambio de la gente, apelando emocionalmente a la pobreza. Como era de esperarse, y como se ha repetido ya en las elecciones en otros países, el fantasma de Hugo Chávez sobrevuela la contienda. Castillo se ha visto obligado a aclarar que no es comunista, que no es chavista. Hace pocos días, en un programa de radio, le mandó un mensaje directo a Nicolás Maduro, pidiéndole que —antes de opinar sobre el Perú— resolviera sus problemas en internos en Venezuela. Y añadió una frase que revela más bien un pensamiento conservador y xenófobo: “Que venga y se lleve a sus compatriotas que han venido, por ejemplo, acá a delinquir”.La supuesta derecha, con Keiko Fujimori, más que representar el pasado, lo encarna. Literalmente. Ha anunciado que, de ganar las elecciones, indultará a su padre. Ante la desventaja en las encuestas, su estrategia de distribución de miedos se ha incrementado. Tratando de alimentar las sospechas sobre su rival, sostiene que Castillo es “un clon real de Hugo Chávez”. Esta confrontación, que parece un círculo ruidoso donde ambos contrincantes solo se dedican a acusarse mutuamente, podrá verse hoy en un debate público de los dos candidatos.Angela Ponce/ReutersLos candidatos presidenciales del Perú, Pedro Castillo y Keiko FujimoriPaolo Aguilar/EPA vía ShutterstockLa invitación de Mario Vargas Llosa a votar por Keiko, argumentando que representa “el mal menor” para el país, es otro síntoma de las limitaciones de la polarización. A diferencia del Vargas Llosa novelista —capaz de abordar y narrar con complejidad el gobierno y derrocamiento de Jacobo Árbenz, por ejemplo—, el Vargas Llosa opinador parece estar continuamente obligado a entrar en el esquema polarizante, a optar y defender cualquier propuesta que se diga o se proclame liberal, en contra de cualquier propuesta que parezca de izquierda. De esta manera, lo mejor —el mal menor— puede ser el regreso a lo peor. Es una lógica que deja en entredicho el sentido y la utilidad de la democracia: un sistema donde el poder del pueblo consiste en resignarse ante una minoría corrupta y autoritaria.Suponer que Keiko Fujimori simboliza la última oportunidad de libertad y que Castillo significa la llegada intempestiva del comunismo implica, entre otras cosas, reducir la historia y la vida social a un nivel de simplicidad enorme. Casi pareciera que, en los últimos diez años, los peruanos no hubieron visto pasar por la presidencia del país a Ollanta Humala, a Pedro Pablo Kuczynski, a Martín Vizcarra, a Manuel Merino, a Francisco Sagasti. Como si no hubieran escuchado y vivido distintas propuestas, ideologías, nexos con la geopolítica regional. La condición apocalíptica de la polarización propone que la actualidad siempre es diferente y definitiva. Somete a los ciudadanos a hacerse responsables —de manera urgente— de las miserias de los actores políticos, así como a vivir postergando de forma permanente las genuinas ansias de cambio de su realidad.En la década de 1950, Williams S. Burroughs realizó un viaje desde Panamá al Perú, buscando tener experiencias con la ayahuasca. Durante el periplo, mantuvo una suerte de diario viajes, en forma de correspondencia con el poeta Allen Ginsberg, cuyo resultado fue un libro extraordinario, titulado Las cartas del Yagé. Al final de su periplo, ya en el Perú, el novelista estadounidense escribe lo siguiente: “Todas las mañanas, se oye el clamor de los chicos que venden Luckies por la calle: ‘A ver, Luckies’. ¿Seguirán gritando ‘A ver, Luckies’ de aquí a cien años? Miedo de pesadilla del estancamiento. Horror de quedarme finalmente clavado en este lugar. Ese miedo me ha perseguido por toda América del Sur. Una sensación horrible y enfermiza de desolación final”.Frente a esta realidad permanente, signada por la desigualdad, la pobreza y la impunidad, la polarización parece un juego pirotécnico, un libreto estridente que se repite sin gracia. El espectáculo que pretende convertir un fracaso conocido en una nueva esperanza.Alberto Barrera Tyszka (@Barreratyszka) es escritor venezolano. Su libro más reciente es la novela Mujeres que matan. More

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      G.O.P. Seeks to Empower Poll Watchers, Raising Intimidation Worries

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      Republicans in several states are pushing bills to give poll watchers more autonomy. Alarmed election officials and voting rights activists say it’s a new attempt to target voters of color.HOUSTON — The red dot of a laser pointer circled downtown Houston on a map during a virtual training of poll watchers by the Harris County Republican Party. It highlighted densely populated, largely Black, Latino and Asian neighborhoods.“This is where the fraud is occurring,” a county Republican official said falsely in a leaked video of the training, which was held in March. A precinct chair in the northeastern, largely white suburbs of Houston, he said he was trying to recruit people from his area “to have the confidence and courage” to act as poll watchers in the circled areas in upcoming elections.A question at the bottom corner of the slide indicated just how many poll watchers the party wanted to mobilize: “Can we build a 10K Election Integrity Brigade?”As Republican lawmakers in major battleground states seek to make voting harder and more confusing through a web of new election laws, they are simultaneously making a concerted legislative push to grant more autonomy and access to partisan poll watchers — citizens trained by a campaign or a party and authorized by local election officials to observe the electoral process.This effort has alarmed election officials and voting rights activists alike: There is a long history of poll watchers being used to intimidate voters and harass election workers, often in ways that target Democratic-leaning communities of color and stoke fears that have the overall effect of voter suppression. During the 2020 election, President Donald J. Trump’s campaign repeatedly promoted its “army” of poll watchers as he publicly implored supporters to venture into heavily Black and Latino cities and hunt for voter fraud.Republicans have offered little evidence to justify a need for poll watchers to have expanded access and autonomy. As they have done for other election changes — including reduced early voting, stricter absentee ballot requirements and limits on drop boxes — they have grounded their reasoning in arguments that their voters want more secure elections. That desire was born in large part out of Mr. Trump’s repeated lies about last year’s presidential contest, which included complaints about insufficient poll watcher access.Now, with disputes over the rules governing voting now at a fever pitch, the rush to empower poll watchers threatens to inject further tension into elections.Both partisan and nonpartisan poll watching have been a key component of American elections for years, and Republicans and Democrats alike have routinely sent trained observers to the polls to monitor the process and report back on any worries. In recent decades, laws have often helped keep aggressive behavior at bay, preventing poll watchers from getting too close to voters or election officials, and maintaining a relatively low threshold for expelling anyone who misbehaves.But now Republican state lawmakers in 20 states have introduced at least 40 bills that would expand the powers of poll watchers, and 12 of those bills in six states are currently progressing through legislatures, according to the Brennan Center for Justice.In Texas, the Republican-controlled Legislature is advancing legislation that would allow them to photograph and video-record voters receiving assistance, as well as make it extremely difficult for election officials to order the removal of poll watchers.The video-recording measure has particularly alarmed voting rights groups, which argue that it could result in the unwanted identification of a voter in a video posted on social media, or allow isolated incidents to be used by partisan news outlets to craft a widespread narrative.“If you have a situation, for example, where people who are poll workers do not have the ability to throw out anybody at the polls who is being disruptive or anyone at the polls who is intimidating voters, that’s essentially authorizing voter intimidation,” said Jon Greenbaum, chief counsel for the nonpartisan Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law.Republicans have been increasingly open in recent years about their intent to line up legions of supporters to monitor the polls. Following the lead of Mr. Trump, they have often framed the observational role in militaristic tones, amplifying their arguments of its necessity with false claims of widespread fraud. Just three years ago, the courts lifted a consent decree that for more than three decades had barred the Republican National Committee from taking an active role in poll watching; in 2020, the committee jumped back into the practice.In Florida, Republicans in the State Legislature passed a new election bill on Thursday that includes a provision allowing one partisan poll watcher per candidate on the ballot during the inspection of votes. The measure carries the potential to significantly overcrowd election officials. The bill also does not stipulate any distance that poll watchers must keep from election workers.In Michigan, a G.O.P. bill would allow challengers to sit close enough to read poll books, tabulators and other election records, and would let them challenge a voter’s eligibility if they had “a good reason.”The Republican drive to empower poll watchers adds to the mounting evidence that much of the party continues to view the 2020 election through the same lens as Mr. Trump, who has repeatedly argued that his losses in key states must have been because of fraud.President Donald J. Trump on the morning after the election. His campaign promoted an “army” of poll watchers.Doug Mills/The New York Times“It seems like the No. 1 goal of these laws is to perpetuate the Big Lie,” said Dale Ho, the director of the Voting Rights Project at the A.C.L.U. “So when you get these unfounded charges that there was fraud or cheating in the election and people say, ‘Well, that’s not detected,’ the purveyors of these lies say, ‘That’s because we weren’t able to observe.’”After the election last year, complaints that poll watchers had not been given enough access, or that their accusations of improperly cast ballots had been ignored, fueled numerous lawsuits filed by the Trump campaign and its Republican allies, nearly all of which failed.In Texas, the leaked video of the Harris County Republican Party’s training, which was published by the voting rights group Common Cause, recalled a similar episode from the 2010 midterm elections.That year, a Tea Party-affiliated group in Houston known as the King Street Patriots sent poll watchers to downtown polling locations. The flood of the mostly white observers into Black neighborhoods caused friction, and resurfaced not-too-distant memories when racial intimidation at the polls was commonplace in the South.The King Street Patriots would eventually evolve into True the Vote, one of the major national organizations now seeking more voting restrictions. Last year, True the Vote joined several lawsuits alleging fraud in the election (all failed) and led countrywide drives to try to recruit more poll watchers.Access for poll watchers is considered sacred by Texas Republicans; in the Legislature, they cited the difficulty in finding observers for drive-through voting and 24-hour voting as one of their reasons for proposing to ban such balloting methods.“Both parties want to have poll watchers, need to have poll watchers present,” State Senator Bryan Hughes, a Republican who sponsored the chamber’s version of the bill, said in an interview last month. “That protects everyone.”While the antagonistic language from the Trump campaign about its poll watchers was already a flash point in November, Democrats and voting rights groups are worried that relaxed rules will lead to more reports of aggressive behavior.In 2020, there were at least 44 reports of inappropriate behavior by poll watchers in Harris County, according to county records obtained by The New York Times. At one polling site on the outskirts of Houston, Cindy Wilson, the nonpartisan election official in charge, reported two aggressive poll watchers who she said had bothered voters and repeatedly challenged the staff.“Two Poll watchers stood close to the black voters (less than 3 feet away) and engaged in what I describe as intimidating behavior,” Ms. Wilson wrote in an email to the Harris County clerk that was obtained by The Times through an open records request.Ms. Wilson said she was not sure which campaign or party the observers were representing.Of course, plenty of interactions with poll workers went smoothly. Merrilee C. Peterson, a poll watcher for a local Republican candidate, worked at a different site, the NRG Arena, and reported no tensions of note.“We still had some of the problems of not thinking we were allowed to get close enough to see,” she said. “But once the little kinks were worked out, quite frankly we worked very well with the poll workers.”In Florida, crowding was the chief concern of election officials.Testifying before state senators, Mark Earley, the vice president of the Florida Supervisors of Elections, said that “as an association, we are very concerned” about the number of poll watchers who would now be allowed to observe the process of duplicating a voter’s damaged or erroneously marked ballot. He said it presented “very grave security risks.”Mr. Earley was backed by at least one Republican, State Senator Jeff Brandes, who found the provision for poll watchers unnecessary and dangerous.“I don’t think we should have to install risers in the supervisor of elections offices or bars by which they can hang upside down in order to ensure that there is a transparent process,” Mr. Brandes said.A crowd that included many Michigan Republicans banged on the windows as workers counted absentee ballots in Detroit on Nov. 4. Brittany Greeson for The New York TimesBut perhaps no other state had a conflict involving poll watchers erupt onto cable news as Michigan did. On Election Day and the day after in November, Republican poll watchers grew increasingly obstructive at the TCF Center in Detroit, where absentee ballots were counted as it became clear that Mr. Trump was losing in the state.It began with a huddle of Republican observers around midday on Nov. 4, according to affidavits from Democratic poll watchers, nonpartisan observers and election officials.Soon after, the Republicans “began to fan out around the room,” wrote Dan McKernan, an election worker.Then they ramped up their objections, accusing workers of entering incorrect birth years or backdating ballots. In some cases, the poll watchers lodged blanket claims of wrongdoing.“The behavior in the room changed dramatically in the afternoon: The rage in the room from Republican challengers was nothing like I had ever experienced in my life,” wrote Anjanette Davenport Hatter, another election worker.Mr. McKernan wrote: “Republicans were challenging everything at the two tables I could see. When the ballot envelope was opened, they would say they couldn’t see it clearly. When the next envelope was opened, they made the same complaint. They were objecting to every single step down the line for no good reason.”The chaos provided some of the basis for Michigan officials to debate whether to certify the results, but a state board did so that month.Now, the Republican-controlled Legislature in Michigan is proposing to bar nonpartisan observers from acting as poll watchers, allowing only partisan challengers to do so.While widespread reports of intimidation never materialized last year, voting rights groups say the atmosphere after the election represents a dangerous shift in American elections.“It really hasn’t been like this for decades, generally speaking, even though there’s a long and storied history of it,” said Michael Waldman, a legal expert at the Brennan Center. Aggressive partisan poll watchers, he said, were “a longstanding barrier to voting in the United States, and it was also largely solved. And this risks bringing it back.” More

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      Palestinian Vote Delayed, Prolonging Split for West Bank and Gaza

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      President Mahmoud Abbas said elections could not take place unless Israel allowed voting in East Jerusalem. But privately, he also fears a poor result for his party, officials said.JERUSALEM — When the Palestinian Authority called in January for parliamentary elections, many Palestinians hoped the vote — the first in the occupied territories since 2006 — would revive Palestinian discourse, re-energize the independence movement and end a 14-year division between Palestinian leaders in the occupied West Bank and Gaza.But those hopes were dashed Thursday night when President Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority announced that the vote, scheduled for May 22, would be delayed indefinitely.The news compounded an unsettled political dynamic across the occupied territories and the state of Israel, where both Israeli and Palestinian societies remain racked by political stalemate and division, where tensions are rising in Jerusalem and Gaza, and a return to peace negotiations appears less likely than ever.The official reason for the postponement was the refusal by the Israeli government to confirm that it would allow voting in East Jerusalem, which was annexed by Israel after the 1967 Arab-Israeli war. East Jerusalem is mainly populated by Palestinians who participate in elections for the Palestinian Authority, a semiautonomous institution that exerts partial jurisdiction in other parts of the occupied territories.“We decided to postpone the legislative elections until guaranteeing that Jerusalem and its people take part,” said Mr. Abbas in a speech in Ramallah. “We don’t give up Jerusalem.”But the postponement also served another purpose: Mr. Abbas was concerned that if the election went ahead, his party, Fatah, might lose ground to two Fatah splinter groups, according to a Palestinian official and a Western diplomat briefed by the Palestinian leadership.A family in a Gaza Strip refugee camp watching  President Mahmoud Abbas announce the election delay Thursday.Said Khatib/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesIsraeli officials, meanwhile, were concerned that the elections would lead to a greater role in the Palestinian leadership for Hamas, the militant Islamist group that wrested control of Gaza from Mr. Abbas in 2007, and which has never recognized Israel.“It is a big mistake to go to these elections,” Kamil Abu Rokon, an Israeli general who oversaw administrative aspects of the occupation until earlier this month, said shortly before leaving his post. “My recommendation is not to cooperate.”Analysts also said the Israeli leaders were happy to keep their Palestinian counterparts divided, since it undermines the Palestinians’ ability to pursue a final status agreement with Israel as a unified bloc.Hamas condemned Mr. Abbas’s decision, describing it as a “coup” that lacked popular support.The development comes amid a volatile period across the West Bank, Gaza and the state of Israel. Israeli politics is also at an impasse, following an election in March — Israel’s fourth in two years — in which both Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his opponents failed to win a workable majority.In Jerusalem, the situation is tense, following a march last week by far-right Jewish supremacists who chanted “Death to Arabs,” attacks on both Palestinians and Jews, and the provocative Israeli decision, now rescinded, to close a central plaza in East Jerusalem where Palestinians enjoy gathering during the ongoing month of Ramadan.That unrest broke months of relative calm in Gaza, where militants fired dozens of rockets toward Israel last weekend to protest the situation in Jerusalem.The city is at the heart of the pretext provided by Mr. Abbas to postpone elections.Under the interim agreements signed in the 1990s between Israeli and Palestinian leaders known as the Oslo Accords, the Israeli government is obliged to allow Palestinian elections in East Jerusalem.President Mahmoud Abbas casting a ballot in the Palestinian parliamentary elections in 2006, the last time elections were held.Muhammed Muheisen/Associated PressBut Israel has neither blocked the election nor agreed to allow it. The Israeli government has not made a decision either way, an Israeli official confirmed, despite requests by the Palestinian leadership. The Israeli police have detained several representatives of Palestinian parties who attempted to campaign in the city. Palestinian officials said that to proceed with an election without East Jerusalem would be tantamount to giving up Palestinian claims on the city and its sacred Islamic sites, including the Aqsa mosque.“It’s not that we are trying to avoid elections,” said Ziad Abu Amr, deputy prime minister of the Palestinian Authority, and an adviser to Mr. Abbas. “Jerusalem cannot be forsaken or abandoned. You can’t surrender to the fait accompli that Israel tries to impose on Jerusalem.”But insiders said Mr. Abbas had an ulterior motive for postponement.Long the engine of the Palestinian national movement, Mr. Abbas’s party, Fatah, now faces unprecedented challenges, not only from its longtime rival Hamas but also from ex-Fatah grandees whose campaigns chipped away at support for their former party.Were elections to go ahead, Fatah’s supporters would be forced to choose among three Fatah-linked factions — the official party; a splinter group led by an exiled former security chief, Muhammad Dahlan; and a second breakaway faction, headed by Nasser al-Kidwa, a former envoy to the United Nations, and Marwan Barghouti, a popular militant serving multiple life sentences in an Israeli prison for five counts of murder.In the most recent poll, Mr. Abbas’s faction still came out on top, with about a quarter of the vote. But it was projected to fall far short of an overall majority because nearly as many voters said they would vote for the rival Fatah groups. Hamas polled under nine percent.No Palestinian official would admit publicly this week that these factors affected Mr. Abbas’s thinking. But speaking on the condition of anonymity, a Palestinian official and a Western diplomat briefed by the Palestinians said that he feared losing influence to his former allies.And after Mr. Kidwa and Mr. Barghouti broke with Mr. Abbas in March, a senior Palestinian official said in an interview with The New York Times that the move put the elections at risk because it risked undermining Fatah.Supporters of an exiled former Fatah security chief, Mohammed Dahlan,  protesting the election delay in Gaza City on Thursday.Mohammed Abed/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images“Fatah’s situation needs to be strong, it needs to lead the Palestine Liberation Organization and the national project,” said Wassel Abu Yousef, a member of the executive committee of the P.L.O., the official representative of the Palestinian people. “If there is harm to the national project, there will be heavy and powerful voices that will be in favor of postponing the elections.”Some Palestinians met the postponement with a shrug. Many felt the elections would not have occurred in a particularly free environment, while some always suspected they would be canceled. Others felt voting for a Palestinian Parliament would have little effect on the biggest problem in their lives: the Israeli occupation.Elections suggest “there is a sovereign entity in which people are participating in a democratic process,” said Yara Hawari, a senior analyst at Al Shabaka, a Palestinian research group. “But you can’t have a full democracy under occupation.”Many Palestinians were nevertheless furious at being deprived of a rare chance to choose their representatives. Crowds of protesters, many of whom were too young to vote in the last Palestinian elections, demonstrated against the decision in both the West Bank and Gaza.“The people demand the ballot box,” they chanted.Muhammad Shehada, a 28-year-old unemployed civil engineer from Gaza City, called the decision “a big disappointment.” The situation in Jerusalem was no reason to cancel the elections, he said: “The occupation controls Jerusalem, whether the elections are held or not.”The lack of elections also raises the specter of intra-Palestinian violence, since different factions will now have no peaceful forum in which to air their grievances and express their frustrations, said Mkhaimar Abusada, a political scientist at Al Azhar University in Gaza City.“Many Palestinians were hoping that elections would ease the tension and friction between the factions,” said Dr. Abusada. But the election delay, he said, “will leave the Palestinians fighting against each other.”Iyad Abuhweila contributed reporting from Gaza City, and Irit Pazner Garshowitz from Jerusalem. More

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      Real Madrid's Marcelo May May Miss Game for Election Duty

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      Unless the Brazilian defender is excused from working at a polling place next week, he may miss his club’s Champions League match at Chelsea.Real Madrid could be without one of its best defenders for a semifinal match in the Champions League next week because he was randomly selected to work a shift at the polls during local elections in Madrid.Marcelo, a fullback who started the first leg of Real Madrid’s semifinal against Chelsea on Tuesday in Spain, was randomly selected by the Spanish government to work at the polls next Tuesday, when there will be elections for seats in the Madrid Assembly, El Mundo reported. A second Madrid player, Victor Chust, was also selected, but he is injured and will not be missed by the team.All registered voters in Spain are eligible to be randomly selected to work at the polls. Though Marcelo, 32, was born in Brazil, he has played for Real since 2007 and has been a Spanish citizen for a decade.Spanish law allows for exemptions, which may be given for “professionals who must participate in public events to be held on the voting day that are scheduled before the electoral call when the party cannot be replaced and his nonparticipation forces suspension of the event, producing economic damages.”In the past, soccer players and others with pressing business have been excused from the polling duty. In 2019, for example, Aitor Fernández, a Levante goalkeeper, did not have to work the polls because his team had a match that day.Even leaving aside whether Marcelo is irreplaceable and whether the game would have to be canceled in his absence, there is another problem for Real’s appeal: In the case of Fernández, his game was the same day as the election. In Marcelo’s case, the second leg of the semifinal against Chelsea in London is not until the following evening. But Real Madrid is planning to travel to England a day early, the same date of the elections, and because of coronavirus protocols it may not be possible for Marcelo to make the trip on game day.El Mundo reported that Marcelo was “very upset by his electoral luck.” Real Madrid and Chelsea tied the first leg, 1-1, on Tuesday, when Chelsea’s Christian Pulisic became the first American to score in the semifinals of the competition.If he has to stay behind, Marcelo will at least pick up a small bonus: Poll workers are paid 65 euros ($78) for their day’s work.A logical replacement for Marcelo at left back would be Ferland Mendy, but it is not clear if he will be ready to return from a calf injury. More

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      John Brennan: Joe Biden Should Watch “The Present”

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      On a recent evening I watched “The Present,” a short film by Farah Nablusi, a Palestinian filmmaker, which was nominated for an Academy Award for live-action short film (the winner in the category was “Two Distant Strangers). Ms. Nablusi’s 25-minute film is a powerful, heartbreaking account of the travails of Yusuf, a Palestinian man, and Yasmine, his young daughter, as they traverse an Israeli military checkpoint in the West Bank twice in a single day.“The Present” establishes its context quickly, opening with images of Palestinian men making their way through a narrow passageway at one of the numerous checkpoints that dot the Israeli-occupied West Bank. Palestinians going to work, visiting family or shopping on the opposite side of a security barrier have to bear this humiliating procedure every day.Yusuf sets out with Yasmine to buy an anniversary gift for his wife. He is held in a chain-link holding pen. The ostensible reason is that the Israeli guards want to search him and his possessions more thoroughly. Yasmine sits nearby, watching and waiting in silence.The scene brought back memories of my first visit to the West Bank in 1975, when I crossed the Jordan River and arrived at an Israeli security post. As a student at the American University in Cairo, I was excited about visiting Jerusalem and spending Christmas Eve in Bethlehem. I joined a relatively short line, which moved at a steady and efficient pace.A few feet away, I could see men, women and children in a much longer line fully enclosed by steel mesh fencing labeled “Palestinians and Arabs.” I saw several subjected to discourtesy and aggressive searches by Israeli soldiers.While I was distressed by what I saw, I knew that Israel had legitimate security concerns in the aftermath of the 1967 and 1973 wars, worries that had been heightened by attacks on Israeli and Jewish targets by Palestinian terrorist organizations.Half a century has passed, and the political and security landscape of the Middle East has profoundly changed.Israel has signed peace treaties with Egypt and Jordan. The Abraham Accords, brokered by the United States last year, have paved the way for four more Arab states — the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Sudan and Morocco — to establish diplomatic relations with Israel. Hopefully, more Arab leaders will follow suit as there is no reason and little geostrategic sense in continuing to deny the reality and permanence of the state of Israel. (Unfortunately, the accords did nothing for the Palestinians except to obtain a suspension of Israeli plans to illegally annex the West Bank.)There also has been significant progress in reducing violence carried out by Palestinians inside and outside the occupied territories. The exception is Hamas, which continues to launch rocket attacks into Israel from the Gaza Strip.In the West Bank, Palestinian security and intelligence services have worked closely with their Israeli, Arab and Western counterparts to disrupt extremist networks and prevent attacks. These Palestinian agencies have demonstrated an impressive degree of professionalism over the past two decades.Despite sharply reduced tensions between Israel and the Arab world, the Palestinian people themselves have seen no appreciable progress in their quest to live in their own sovereign state. Political fissures and the ineffective political leadership of the Palestinian Authority have contributed to stymying ambitions for Palestinian nationhood.But that could change. Legislative elections in May and presidential elections in July in the West Bank and Gaza offer Palestinians an opportunity to elect representatives capable of conducting a more effectual political dialogue within the Palestinian homeland and beyond. Palestinian candidates who do not bear the sclerotic reputations of political incumbents, if elected, would help soften the deep-rooted cynicism that many Israeli officials display toward Palestinian negotiators.The major hurdle will be to reverse the trend of diminished interest that the Israeli government has shown in pursuing a two-state solution. Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has spearheaded relentless expansion of settlements in the West Bank. That expansion has brought along more concrete walls, security barriers and control points, further reducing the spaces where Palestinians can live, graze their flocks, tend their olive groves and vegetable gardens without being challenged by their occupiers.Unfortunately, during the Trump years, the United States ignored Palestinian interests and aspirations. Mr. Trump moved the American Embassy in Israel to Jerusalem, rejecting the position of all previous U.S. administrations that it would endanger final status negotiations on that contested city. He senselessly severed funding to the Palestinian Authority and ended our contributions to the United Nations for Palestinian refugee assistance.In a welcome change, the Biden administration has authorized the release of $235 million for humanitarian, economic and development programs supporting Palestinians in the West Bank, Gaza and elsewhere in the region.The concluding scene of “The Present” shows Yusuf, tired and hobbled with back pain, increasingly angry and on the verge of violence as he attempts to return home with the anniversary gift. His chilling, emotional outburst made me think of the frustration felt by every Palestinian who has to live with the stifling security measures and political oppression attendant to Israel’s military occupation.It was his little daughter, Yasmine, though, who gave me most pause and concern. She watched her father’s patience, dignity and humanity steadily erode.I can only imagine the imprint such experiences have on the young girls and boys who live in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. They grow up traumatized by injustice, discrimination and violence. They live with the feeling that their existence is controlled by people who don’t care about their welfare, their safety or their future.The Biden administration is dealing with a dizzying array of domestic and international problems but the Palestinian quest for statehood deserves the early engagement of his national security team. The United States needs to tell Israeli leaders to cease provocative settlement construction and the sort of oppressive security practices depicted in “The Present.”A clear signal from President Biden that he expects and is ready to facilitate serious Israeli-Palestinian discussions on a two-state solution would be of great political significance.John Brennan is a former director of the Central Intelligence Agency.The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: letters@nytimes.com.Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram. More