Today’s News from the University of Kansas
Headlines
Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu will be reelected, expert predicts
LAWRENCE – It will take a few days after the March 23 national election – Israel’s fourth in two years — before results are finalized, but Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is highly likely to come out on top again, according to Rami Zeedan, assistant professor of Jewish studies at the University of Kansas.
Political science professor Jack Zhang awarded 2021 Wilson China Fellowship
LAWRENCE — A University of Kansas political scientist is among 25 scholars from across the nation named to the 2021 Wilson China Fellowship class. Jack Zhang, assistant professor of political science and creator of the KU Trade War Lab, was awarded the China-focused nonresidential fellowship that supports the next generation of U.S. scholarship on China.
KU nominates Lawrence junior for the Beinecke Scholarship Program
LAWRENCE — The University of Kansas has nominated Katherine Price, of Lawrence, for the Beinecke Scholarship Program. Each year the Beinecke Scholarship offers 20 scholarships to undergraduates who intend to pursue a research-focused master’s or doctoral program in the arts, humanities or social sciences. Selected students receive $30,000 to be used for graduate study and $4,000 in their senior year.
Full stories below.
Contact: Rick Hellman, KU News Service, 785-864-8852, [email protected], @RickHellman
Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu will be reelected, expert predicts
LAWRENCE – It will take a few days after the March 23 national election — Israel’s fourth in two years — before results are finalized, but “master of his domain” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is highly likely to come out on top again, according to an expert on Israeli demographics.
Rami Zeedan is an assistant professor of Jewish studies at the University of Kansas and a member of Israel’s Druze minority, and he has written extensively about Arab voting patterns within the Jewish state. He is available to journalists to comment before or after the election.
Netanyahu effectively splitting off one of the small parties, breaking up the Arab Joint List opposing him this time, is but one example of his political mastery, Zeedan said in a recent interview. Israel’s political landscape is famously fractured, and Netanyahu, also known as “Bibi,” takes advantage of this, Zeedan said. More than 30 parties are running now, of whom Zeedan said 14 have a realistic chance to pass the minimum threshold of 3.25% of the vote to gain seats in the Knesset.
At least, Zeedan said, this race is more interesting than the last couple of elections.
“Last time we believed there were eight parties that safely would get seats, which is what happened at the end,” Zeedan said.
The Jewish studies researcher said that of the 14 parties with realistic chances, there are six parties hovering around the threshold of viability.
Zeedan predicts at least one of these parties, and possibly up to four, will not clear the threshold, despite gaining a considerable number of votes – as many as 130,000 each. These are termed “wasted votes” and are not counted toward the final allocation of seats.
“Since this is going to be a close election, even a handful of votes can tip the point for these four parties,” Zeedan said. “If they pass or not, it will change the distribution of seats to the other parties.”
Restrictions imposed by the COVID-19 pandemic will contribute to delays of a week or so in determining the final result following election day, Zeedan said. In the past, voting by what are called “double envelopes” was allowed only for Israeli soldiers, diplomats overseas, hospital patients and prisoners. This year, those “double envelopes” will double because of the pandemic. More people will be allowed to vote at polls other than the one designated for them. For example, there are special voting stations for those sick with COVID-19 and those in quarantine.
“Netanyahu is very close to getting the 61 seats to guarantee himself a right-religious-wing coalition, without the need for any centrist or left-wing parties,” Zeedan said. “That would mean that he would continue as prime minister, and maybe even enact new laws that would cancel his corruption trial that already started.
“You would need some weird combination and some luck for the other side to put him out of power this time. … He is the master of this domain. He has done this repeatedly in the past few years, and he will do it again.”
In conclusion, Zeedan said, “what I see is Netanyahu doing whatever he can — and more than what is allowed and what he is not allowed to do — in order to remain prime minister and to influence the progress of his own trial.”
To interview Zeedan, contact Rick Hellman, KU News Service public affairs officer, at 913-620-8786 or [email protected].
The official university Twitter account has changed to @UnivOfKansas.
Refollow @KUNews for KU News Service stories, discoveries and experts.
Contact: Erinn Barcomb-Peterson, KU News Service, 785-864-8858, [email protected], @ebpkansas
Political science professor Jack Zhang awarded 2021 Wilson China Fellowship
LAWRENCE — A University of Kansas political scientist is among 25 scholars from across the nation named to the 2021 Wilson China Fellowship class.
Jack Zhang, assistant professor of political science, was awarded the China-focused nonresidential fellowship that supports the next generation of U.S. scholarship on China.
The Wilson China Fellowship is operated by the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars’ Asia Program, in conjunction with the Kissinger Institute on China and the United States.
The aim of this fellowship is to produce new and original pieces of research that improve understanding of the role that China is playing in the Indo-Pacific, its relations with its neighbors and the United States, and its influence on peace and security issues.
This year’s class includes scholars and practitioners working in a diverse range of policy-relevant issue areas vital to understanding the rise of China and its implications for the United States and the world. Their projects range from explorations of internal Chinese political dynamics to the state of U.S.-China competition in Southeast Asia.
Zhang’s project will be “Multinational Corporations and Economic Statecraft in U.S.-China Competition.”
“I am delighted to be selected for this fellowship,” Zhang said. “I’m eager to use this opportunity to establish a research program at KU that analyzes the political economy of the U.S.-China rivalry and engages with the public at a national, regional and local level on the cause and consequences of economic competition with China.”
In 2019, Zhang established the KU Trade War Lab, which provides a bottom-up, firm-centric view of the U.S.-China trade war. His lab has grown to include three graduate students and eight undergraduate research assistants. He is a core faculty member at the KU Center for East Asian Studies and teaches courses on the Politics of East Asia, the Political Economy of East Asia and International Relations of Asia.
Subscribe to KU Today, the campus newsletter,
for additional news about the University of Kansas.
http://www.news.ku.edu
Contact: Andy Hyland, Office of Public Affairs, 785-864-7100, [email protected], @UnivOfKansas
KU nominates junior for the Beinecke Scholarship Program
LAWRENCE — The University of Kansas has nominated a junior for the Beinecke Scholarship Program. Each year the Beinecke Scholarship offers 20 scholarships to undergraduates who intend to pursue a research-focused master’s or doctoral program in the arts, humanities or social sciences. Selected students receive $30,000 to be used for graduate study and $4,000 in their senior year.
KU’s nominee is Katherine Price of Lawrence, a junior majoring in history with minors in French and education studies. Price is the daughter of Robert and Rachel Price. Price is a member of the University Honors Program, serves as an undergraduate representative to the Department of History and has worked for two years at KU’s Hilltop Child Development Center. Currently studying abroad in Angers, France, Price has received study abroad scholarships from Study Abroad & Global Engagement and from the departments of history and French, Francophone & Italian Studies.
Price has worked as a research assistant for Andrew Denning, associate professor of history, and completed internships with the Wakarusa River Valley Heritage Museum and the Wyandotte County Historical Society. This spring, she is a recipient of an Undergraduate Research Award from the Center for Undergraduate Research.
Her paper, “Contradictions in the Treatment of Roma and Sinti During the Holocaust,” has been published in Zenith! Undergraduate Research Journal for the Humanities.
Only 135 colleges and universities around the country are invited to nominate one student for the scholarship each year. KU is the only participating institution in Kansas. At KU, the nomination process is coordinated by the Office of Fellowships.
The Beinecke Scholarship Program was established in 1971 by the board of directors of the Sperry and Hutchinson Company to honor Edwin, Frederick, and Walter Beinecke. The board created an endowment to provide substantial scholarships for the graduate education of young people of exceptional promise. Candidates should be U.S. citizens and college juniors who demonstrate superior standards of intellectual ability, scholastic achievement and personal promise during their undergraduate career.
KU News Service
1450 Jayhawk Blvd.
Lawrence KS 66045
Phone: 785-864-3256
Fax: 785-864-3339
[email protected]
http://www.news.ku.edu
Erinn Barcomb-Peterson, director of news and media relations, [email protected]
Today’s News is a free service from the Office of Public Affairs | http://www.news.ku.edu
