A phone campaign by the Noam party managed to rattle the left on election day. The Movement for Quality Government filed an urgent petition today (Tuesday) with Central Elections Committee Chairman Justice Noam Solberg against party chairman MK Avi Maoz, requesting a temporary injunction ordering the party to immediately stop distributing the recording.
2+At the center of the storm is “Ofek,” a child calling voters “from the year 2046.” In the recording, he says he was born during this election week and has one request: “Tomorrow at the ballot box, you’ll decide whether I learn Jewish values or values you wouldn’t bring into your own home.” In an updated version of the recording, Ofek says people go to the polls thinking about security and the economy, “but who will educate me, what values will I grow up with? That’s what they forget.”
2+The call caught on quickly. The party distributed SMS messages inviting the public to call and hear “the child Ofek 2046 from Noam.” The petition also quoted Roy Yanovsky, who wrote on X that this was the only call where he stayed until the end and didn’t hang up.
The Movement for Quality Government claims the recording violates the ban on participation of children under 15 in election campaigning. But a review of the petition reveals the petitioners present two different possibilities: one section claims the child’s voice was “apparently created using digital means,” and therefore requires a disclosure notice about “deepfake.” Another section claims that if digital means weren’t used, this is a real child being exploited for election propaganda.
2+The petition also reveals that the Movement didn’t contact the party before filing, even though prior contact is a requirement in such proceedings. The Movement claimed that concern over continued distribution of the recording on election day justifies deviating from the rule. Justice Solberg ordered Maoz and the party to clarify by 3:30 PM whether the voice in the recording is that of a real child under 15.
Noam wasn’t rattled by the petition. Alongside the legal proceedings, the party launched another phone campaign—this time the voice on the other end of the line is “Rashida,” an Arab assistant at a kindergarten. In the recording, Rashida asks voters not to vote for Noam because the party intends to stop the trend of growth in the number of Arab kindergarten teachers and assistants in the Jewish education system in recent years.
The new campaign continues Ofek’s line and centers on the issue the party defines as the core of its struggle: who will educate Israel’s children and on what values. Noam said in a statement: “The Movement for Quality Government doesn’t know if Ofek is a real child or artificial intelligence, but one thing it knows for certain: he can’t be heard. That’s the whole story of the Israeli left. When a Jewish child asks for Jewish education, they run to court. On election day, without prior contact, in a panic. What scares them isn’t Ofek’s voice, but the question he’s asking every parent in Israel: who will educate your child? We won’t be silenced. Ofek keeps talking, and tomorrow at the ballot box hundreds of thousands of parents will answer him.”