A thousand buses traveling the roads will carry UTJ's message
to various segments of the population around the country.
Opinion surveys commissioned by UTJ's publicity bureau
indicate the party platform should be brought into every
strata of Israeli society, where confusion and uncertainty
abound and many voters feel disinclined to support any of the
secular parties, creating an unprecedented number of
undecided votes in the current campaign.
Even people who lead lives totally void of Torah and mitzvas,
but who feel an affinity for Jewish tradition understand that
only UTJ offers a solid anchor of truth, fairness and concern
for the poor as well as the preservation of the country's
Jewishness. This understanding has already been reflected in
surveys giving UTJ six or seven votes in the 17th Knesset
compared to five in the outgoing Knesset.
Voting experts say the chareidi sector must be sent a clear
message that the vote of anyone who does not make the effort
to vote as per directives issued by gedolei Yisroel,
either due to laziness or for any other reason, will in
effect by split by all of the other parties.
UTJ activists say that in the current election campaign the
various parties are trying — even more than usual
— to deflect attention from the main issues and to
focus voters' interest on side issues. According to the UTJ
election staff, non-chareidi voters do not face the threat of
having their right to send their children to school or
college denied if the party they vote for does not win, while
the chareidi voter realizes the success of the UTJ list will
have direct repercussions on the government's attitude toward
chareidi education, yeshivas, kollelim, the rights of
chareidi families and matters related to the sanctity of Am
Yisroel.
Jerusalem will play a key role in the election campaign due
to the large number of votes in the city's chareidi
neighborhoods, therefore every effort must be made to
mobilize the public and dispel voter apathy.
According to Staff Organization Chairman MK Rabbi Moshe
Gafni, "We are currently in a new situation in which money is
not needed, rather legal arrangements to uphold the status of
the various institutions, from kindergartens, schools and
talmudei Torah to seminaries, yeshivas and
kollelim...to prevent the scheming that has been their
lot recently. One or two additional mandates for UTJ can be
fateful for the most basic things for the chareidi
public."
