The Independent Liberals were a political party in Israel

Israel

The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...

 between the 1960s and 1980s.

History

The Independent Liberals party was formed during the fifth Knesset

Israeli legislative election, 1961

Elections for the fifth Knesset were held in Israel on 15 August 1961. Voter turnout was 81.6%.-Results:¹ Eight MKs broke away from Mapai to establish Rafi² Herut and the Liberal Party merged to form Gahal...

 in the aftermath of the merger of the Liberal Party

Liberal Party (Israel)

The Israeli Liberal Party was a political party in Israel and is one of the ancestors of the modern-day Likud.-History:The Liberal Party was formed on 8 May 1961, towards the end of the fourth Knesset, by a merger of the General Zionists and the Progressive Party, with the new party having 14...

 and Herut

Herut

Herut was the major right-wing political party in Israel from the 1940s until its formal merger into Likud in 1988, and an adherent of Revisionist Zionism.-History:...

. Seven of the 17 Liberal Party MKs led by former Minister of Justice, Pinchas Rosen

Pinchas Rosen

Pinchas Rosen was an Israeli politician and statesman, and the country's first Minister of Justice, serving three times during 1948-51, 1952–56, and 1958-61. He was also leader of the Independent Liberals during the 1960s.-Biography:...

, disagreed with the merger and founded a new party in response. Almost all of the dissenters were former members of the Progressive Party

Progressive Party (Israel)

The Progressive Party was a political party in Israel.-History:The Progressive Party was a liberal party, most of whose founders came from the ranks of the New Aliyah Party and HaOved HaTzioni, which had been active prior to independence...

, which had merged with the General Zionists

General Zionists

The General Zionists were centrists within the Zionist movement and a political party in Israel. Their political arm is an ancestor of the modern-day Likud.-History:...

 to create the Liberal Party during the fourth Knesset

Israeli legislative election, 1959

Elections for the fourth Knesset were held in Israel on 3 November 1959. Voter turnout was 81.5%.-Results:¹ The General Zionists and the Progressive Party merged to form the Liberal Party....

, and also included Rachel Cohen-Kagan

Rachel Cohen-Kagan

Rachel Cohen-Kagan was a Zionist activist and Israeli politician, and one of only two women to sign the Israeli declaration of independence.-Biography:...

, formerly an MK for WIZO

Women's International Zionist Organization

The Women's International Zionist Organization , is a volunteer organization dedicated to social welfare in all sectors of Israeli society, the advancement of the status of women, and Jewish education in Israel and the Diaspora.-History:...

.

In their first electoral test, the 1965 elections

Israeli legislative election, 1965

Elections for the sixth Knesset were held in Israel on 1 November 1965. Voter turnout was 85.9%.-Background:Prior to the elections, two major alliances were formed; Mapai and Ahdut HaAvoda united to form the Alignment, whilst Herut and the Liberal Party had formed the Gahal alliance towards the end...

, the Independent Liberals won 5 seats and joined Levi Eshkol

Levi Eshkol

' served as the third Prime Minister of Israel from 1963 until his death from a heart attack in 1969. He was the first Israeli Prime Minister to die in office.-Biography:...

 and Golda Meir

Golda Meir

Golda Meir ; May 3, 1898 – December 8, 1978) was a teacher, kibbutznik and politician who became the fourth Prime Minister of the State of Israel....

's coalition governments, with Moshe Kol

Moshe Kol

Moshe Kol was a Zionist activist and Israeli politician and one of the signatories of the Israeli declaration of independence.-Biography:Born in Pinsk in the Russian Empire , Kol studied at a heder and Hebrew high school in his home town, and was one of the founders of HaOved HaTzioni youth...

 appointed Minister of Tourism and Minister of Development

Development Minister of Israel

The Ministry for the Development of the Negev and Galilee is a ministry in the Israeli government. Established in January 2005, the current minister is Silvan Shalom of Likud.In the past, there was also a Development Minister...

. During the sixth Knesset they lost one seat when Yizhar Harari

Yizhar Harari

-Biography:Harari was born in Jaffa, then under Ottoman rule. He studied political science and journalism at the University of Paris and then law at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and economics and political science in London, and was certified as a lawyer. In 1933, he worked as a journalist...

 left the party to join the Alignment

Alignment (political party)

The Alignment was an alliance of the major left-wing parties in Israel between the 1960s and 1990s. It was established in 1965 as an alliance of Mapai and Ahdut HaAvoda but was dissolved three years later when the two parties and Rafi formally merged into the Israeli Labor Party...

.

In the 1969 elections

Israeli legislative election, 1969

Elections for the seventh Knesset were held in Israel on 28 October 1969. Voter turnout was 81.7%.-Results:¹ Meir Avizohar defected from the National List to the Alignment² Avner Shaki left the National Religious Party and remained a single MK...

 the party won four seats and were again included in Meir's coalition government. Kol retained his post as Minister of Tourism. The party also won four seats in the 1973 elections

Israeli legislative election, 1973

The Elections for the eighth Knesset were held on 31 December 1973. Voter turnout was 78.6%.-Results:1 Aryeh Eliav left the Alignment and merged with Ratz to form Ya'ad - Civil Rights Movement...

 and were included in both of Meir and Yitzhak Rabin

Yitzhak Rabin

' was an Israeli politician, statesman and general. He was the fifth Prime Minister of Israel, serving two terms in office, 1974–77 and 1992 until his assassination in 1995....

's coalition governments. Kol again retained his post as Minister of Tourism and Gideon Hausner

Gideon Hausner

Gideon Hausner was an Israeli jurist and politician. Between 1960 and 1963 he served as Attorney General, and was later elected to the Knesset and served in the cabinet....

 was made a Minister without Portfolio. However, they lost one seat when Hillel Seidel

Hillel Seidel

Hillel Seidel was an Israeli politician who served as a member of the Knesset for the Independent Liberals and Likud between 1974 and 1981.-Biography:...

 defected to Likud

Likud

Likud is the major center-right political party in Israel. It was founded in 1973 by Menachem Begin in an alliance with several right-wing and liberal parties. Likud's victory in the 1977 elections was a major turning point in the country's political history, marking the first time the left had...

.

The 1977 elections

Israeli legislative election, 1977

The Elections for the ninth Knesset were held on 17 May 1977. For the first time in Israeli political history, the right-wing, led by Likud, won the election, ending almost 30 years of rule by the left-wing Alignment and its predecessor, Mapai...

 saw the party win only one seat, barely crossing the 1% electoral threshold (they received 1.3% of the vote). The party was also excluded from Menachem Begin

Menachem Begin

' was a politician, founder of Likud and the sixth Prime Minister of the State of Israel. Before independence, he was the leader of the Zionist militant group Irgun, the Revisionist breakaway from the larger Jewish paramilitary organization Haganah. He proclaimed a revolt, on 1 February 1944,...

's right-wing

Right-wing politics

In politics, Right, right-wing and rightist generally refer to support for a hierarchical society justified on the basis of an appeal to natural law or tradition. To varying degrees, the Right rejects the egalitarian objectives of left-wing politics, claiming that the imposition of equality is...

 coalition. The 1981 elections

Israeli legislative election, 1981

Elections for the tenth Knesset were held in Israel on 30 June 1981. Despite last minute polls suggesting a victory for Shimon Peres's Alignment, Menachem Begin's Likud won by just one seat...

 saw the party fail to cross the electoral threshold and disappear from the Knesset. For the 1984 elections

Israeli legislative election, 1984

Elections for the eleventh Knesset were held in Israel on 23 July 1984. Voter turnout was 78.8%. The results saw the Alignment return to being the largest party in the Knesset, a status it had lost in 1977...

 the party merged into the Alignment, with its leader Yitzhak Artzi

Yitzhak Artzi

Yitzhak Artzi was an Israeli politician who served as a member of the Knesset between 1984 and 1988.-Biography:Artzi was born Izo Hertzig in Siret, Romania into a Hassidic family. He was educated at high schools in his hometown and Chernivtsi, before attending the Jewish College in Bucharest...

given 44th place on the Alignment list, ceasing to exist as an independent party.

External links

• Independent Liberals Knesset website