279. What does being right- or left-wing mean in Israel?

Since the creation of the State of Israel, there were two parties with different political right- and left-wing tendencies. For example, two tendencies originated from the governing socialist party, Mapai: that of David Ben-Gurion, who was an activist (this group included Moshe Dayan, Shimon Peres and Ygal Alon), while the moderate wing was represented by Moshe Sharett. After the Six-Day War of 1967, the “Foreign Policy and Security” axis, the same that divides the Israeli political map between “left” and “right”, became the main one when defining the national elections, relegating other sectors. It is not the only factor that defines the Israeli vote, but it stands out above the others. The terms used in Israeli politics are “Hawks” (right-wing) and “Doves” (left-wing). A Hawk (extreme) is a person who believes that there is no Palestinian party to negotiate a peace agreement, who does not want to give the territorial control over Judea and Samaria, does not want to divide Jerusalem, does not want to give up to the Golan Heights, and does not accept the return of Palestinian refugees to Israel. A Dove (left) thinks the opposite. In Israeli politics, most of the political parties accept one or several premises of Hawks or Doves, and very few people are in the extremes. For example, most of the left-wing Israelis are in favor of maintaining control over the territorial blocks. They are not in favor of returning all territories. On the other hand, a good part of the Hawks accept giving up territories and they are willing to co-exist with a Palestinian state. In Israel, left and right are political-security concepts and not socio-economic differences.