I would like to see such a debate... actually I would like to see any real debate between political opponents. There is no culture of electoral debates here, and when they have them they are not real debates... but I would like to see this. I hope Lapid accepts the challenge.

That being said, I am not sure why Deri is doing this. Deri's voters, generally, are not debating between Shas and Kachol Lavan. Maybe he wants the stage to get his anti-secular pro-Jewish message across and the best way to do that is opposing Lapid.

The last line he closes with is cute and funny. The truth is, nobody in Shas can do anything without Deri's permission either..

 

this is the full "debate" between the four Jerusalem mayoral candidates, Yossi Deitsch, Zeev Elkin, Ofer Berkovitch and Moshe Li-On. I put "debate" in quotation marks because Israeli politics don't really have a culture of debates and they are really just arguments, not debates.

this debate challenge is silly. Netanyahu is right for not jumping to participate, even though it is favorable to him. You cannot have a sitting prime minister debate the heads of all the parties together. The entire thing, even forgetting about Netanyahu, is unworkable. They want an American style election debate, but the electoral system is different here than in the USA. Some of the parties have nothing on their agenda except for one or two issues.

If they want a real debate, and I think it should happen, they shopuld have two seperate debates:
1. a debate between Netanyahu and Herzog-Livni, the candidates for the Prime Ministerial spot
2. a debate among heads of parties, not including Herzog and Netanyahu (though maybe Likud and Labor should send the number 2 person)

I might even say a third debate - the second, above, would be participants from the main parties (that would have to be defined somehow), and the third would be representatives from the smaller parties.

These would be good debates.

One large debate, with the heads of every single party, as is proposed right now, would accomplish nothing. They would not have enough time for each rep to present and debate on each issue. Splitting the prime ministerial debate and the party debate is a better idea, in my opinion.

5+ years ago, prior to the previous elections, the candidates running for the position of mayor of Bet Shemesh held a debate. An actual debate, American style. It left a lot to be desired in its format and especially in the moderation, but it was definitely something that is rarely seen here in Israel.

There has been no debate this time around, but there is a sort of online debate - both Moshe Abutbol and Eli Cohen have written pieces for the Jerusalem Post... not really a debate. not a debate at all, actually, but as close as we are going to get.

Moshe Abutbol

Eli Cohen

I have not seen an article by the third candidate Meir Balayish.


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I was always fascinated by the historic debates, actually the background of those debates rather than the arguments themselves, about Judaism, such as the supposed debate written about by Rabbi Yehuda HaLevi between the king of the Khazars and a simple Jew, such as between the Ramban and Pablo Christiani, among others. The idea of a debate in which everything is on the line is exciting.

This debate is not quite at that level, where everything is on the line, where the victor might be at the threat of death or banishment, but it is interesting nonetheless. This is more of the modern day type of debate where a couple well-versed people get together to see who can present better, or maybe who knows a little more than the other. This debate almost reminds me of the great book jointly written by Reform Rabbi Ammiel Hirsch and Orthodox Rabbi  Yaakov Yosef Reinman in which they publish a debate about the major issues in Judaism that they discussed via email.

Rabbi Moshe averick, author of the book, "Nonsense of a High Order: The Confused and Illusory World of the Atheist" about the flaws of atheist ideology, has invited a proclaimed ideological atheist to a debate about atheism and Judaism.

Averick extended the invitation, er challenge, to Shauli Grossman, via his article in The Algemeiner a few weeks ago:

[...] Under “religious views” he wrote: “shul [synagogue] of the flying spaghetti monster.” For those who are unaware, “the flying spaghetti monster” has become a standard atheistic metaphor used to mock religious beliefs as in “you believe in something as ridiculous as angels, I believe in the flying spaghetti monster.” While the “shul of the flying spaghetti monster” might not be conclusive, the following does not leave much to the imagination: In “People Who Inspire Shauli” he has listed three of the most prominent “new atheist” ideologues: Christopher Hitchens, Sam Harris, and Richard Dawkins. It would seem reasonable to assume then that Mr. Gross is a committed ideological atheist himself. He also described himself as “A puS**Ter yid” – poking fun in a vulgar sort of way at the common Yiddish expression “A Poshitah yid” which means “A simple Jew.” Interestingly enough, I recently posted a song on YouTube that I wrote and recorded in Jerusalem called “Just A Simple Jew.” (It hasn’t gone viral yet, but I’m still hoping)

As I explained earlier, I have no intention of expressing any opinion on Shauli Grossman’s personal experiences or the particular lifestyle he has chosen to lead. However, the ideology of atheism as expressed by writers like Hitchens, Dawkins, and Harris interests me very much. All three are discussed in my book (whose title does not leave much to the imagination as to where I stand on these issues), Nonsense of High Order: The Confused and Illusory World of the Atheist. It is one thing to make personal choices; it is another to mislead people with ideas and ideologies which are utterly false. If Mr. Grossman is inspired by these people and is prepared to go on national TV to express his opinions, perhaps the following challenge will be of interest to him:

Dear Mr. Grossman (R. Shauli): As we both know, Talmudic literature is filled with metaphors comparing the arguments that took place between the sages regarding Jewish law and thought, with the idea of warriors battling one against the other. I respectfully invite/challenge you – from one “simple Jew” to another – to articulate and defend your new-chosen atheistic ideology in the arena of the intellect. Let us meet and debate the issue in a proper forum. I think the best place to start would be at the very beginning (always a very good place to start). I suggest “Does the Origin of Life require the existence of a Creator?” I look forward to hearing from you. May the truth win out.

While I don't know if either of them are an authority on the matter, or in general in any way, I am not sure that it matters. Must one be a national leader of sorts, or the head of a large movement, in order to hold a serious debate? Not at all. The only thing is that when it is just two guys arguing about something, the results don't matter much to anybody else. Maybe this one lost because he just was not well-versed enough, or maybe the other guy was a bit more charismatic or boisterous. Without a large following of people who will act on the results of the debate, the debate is just a simple discussion between two people. Nice, but does it matter?

Either way, even if there are no ramifications to the actual debate, if it happens it will be interesting to  keep an eye on. I have not seen any response yet from Grossman regarding the debate invitation, but I am hoping some interesting reading will come out of this..


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