Voting is set to begin on Monday for an election that presents American Jews with a unique opportunity to influence the future of Israel.
The U.S. election for seats in the 39th World Zionist Congress will play a crucial role in determining the direction of the Zionist organization established by Theodore Herzl 128 years ago.
The outcome of the election will impact the distribution of over $5 billion in funding for Jewish causes and the governance of key institutions such as the Jewish Agency and the Jewish National Fund, which holds 13% of Israeli land.
All Jewish adults residing in the United States have the opportunity to vote until May 4 after accepting a set of Zionist principles and paying a $5 registration fee.
At the core of this election is a fierce ideological battle between liberal and right-wing Orthodox factions, each vying to shape the future of Zionist institutions and their financial priorities at a critical juncture in Israel’s history. The election results will have implications for crucial issues such as religious pluralism, Jewish education funding, settlement expansion, and Israel-Diaspora relations.
“This election is about nothing less than the soul of the State of Israel and the Jewish people,” said Rabbi Josh Weinberg, who leads the campaign for the Reform movement’s liberal slate of candidates. “There are multiple competing visions over what it means to have a Jewish state and essentially to be Jewish. We can help decide some of those things through a democratic process.”
These are the 21 slates U.S. Jews can vote for in the 2025 World Zionist Congress election
The Vote Reform slate, led by Weinberg, is one of the 21 lists competing for the 152 seats allocated to American Jewry in the upcoming congress. This marks a significant increase from the 15 slates that participated in the previous election five years ago. The winning slate will work alongside 173 representatives chosen by Jewish communities across the Diaspora and 200 representatives from Israel, selected by Israeli political parties based on their parliamentary seat allocation.
In the last election, the Reform slate garnered the most American votes, but it was the Orthodox lists that made a significant impact.
The success of Mizrachi, supported by Modern Orthodox institutions, and Eretz Hakodesh, a new haredi Orthodox slate, shifted the balance in favor of the right-wing bloc at the congress for the first time.
In the current election, Eretz Hakodesh aims to build on its previous achievements.
“We invite all who share our values and beliefs to join us and witness the remarkable impact we have made in recent years,” the slate stated after declining an interview request.
Many of the new slates in this election share similar platforms with Eretz Hakodesh, advocating Orthodox religious values or pro-settlement politics, or both. These slates differ in their target demographics, with Am Yisrael Chai focusing on college students and young professionals, the Israeli American Council slate targeting Israeli expats, and Beyachad catering to Russian-speaking Jews.
The left also has representation with the Israeli ex-pat slate AID Coalition, comprising supporters of the Israeli protest movement that has been challenging the Netanyahu government through weekly demonstrations. ANU: A New Union is another left-wing slate focusing on the youth vote.
While American Jews tend to lean left overall, low voter turnout poses a challenge for ensuring representation in the congress. Despite nearly 6 million Jewish adults in the U.S., only 125,000 voted in the 2020 election, a significant increase from the 56,000 votes cast in 2015. The highest turnout was in 1987 with around 211,000 voters.
Yizhar Hess, vice chairman of the World Zionist Organization, views the issue of low turnout as a “shande,” or shame, that threatens the pluralism fundamental to Zionism. He is working to raise awareness about the election by engaging with congregations and other gatherings.
“If the congress is called ‘the parliament of the Jewish people’ it should reflect the makeup of world Jewry,” he said. “That’s why I am investing many hours every day in order to convince the Jews of the diaspora to make their voice heard.”
Keep Jewish Stories in Focus.
JTA has documented Jewish history in real-time for over a century. Keep our journalism strong by joining us in supporting independent, award-winning reporting.