Speaking at The Jerusalem Post Conference, Batell V. Blaish-Sultanik said the organization is working to turn voter eligibility among Israelis abroad into voter turnout by addressing the logistical challenges of participating in Israel’s 2026 election.
AID-Coalition is working to ensure that Israeli citizens living abroad are able to return home and vote in Israel’s 2026 election, co-founder and CEO Batell Blaish-Sultanik said at the Jerusalem Post Conference, framing the effort as a mission to turn “every Israeli voice” into “an Israeli vote.”
Blaish-Sultanik, a former Israeli naval officer and ex-deputy commander of a missile vessel turned tech executive, said the organization is not focused on political persuasion, but on helping Israelis abroad overcome the practical barriers that stand between them and the ballot box.
“At AID-Coalition, we made a commitment: an Israeli vote for every Israeli voice,” she said. “We are not in the business of persuasion, only participation. We don’t back a side. We back the right to vote.”
She said the challenge is especially urgent because Israel does not allow absentee voting for most citizens abroad, meaning that Israelis outside the country must physically return to Israel if they want to cast a ballot.
“But Israel has no absentee voting, no absentee ballots,” she said. “If you are an Israeli citizen abroad, the only way your voice becomes a vote is when you show up physically at the polling station in Israel.”
Blaish-Sultanik described the problem as one of logistics, arguing that distance should not be treated as a reason for Israelis abroad to lose their voice in the country’s democratic process.
“And that, my friends, is an interface problem,” she said. “And if there is one thing this room, the Startup Nation, knows how to solve, it is interface problems.”
She said AID-Coalition had surveyed 4,500 Israelis abroad and found that 84% described the coming election as the most crucial in Israel’s history, while 73% said they wanted to return to vote and 43% said they would do whatever it takes to participate.
“Distance is not a reason to lose your voice,” she said. “It is a logistics problem.”
Blaish-Sultanik framed Israel itself as a national venture, comparing the state to a startup whose citizens are its shareholders.
“This venture is called the State of Israel,” she said. “It launched like a startup, and like many startups, it is facing real turbulence, from internal challenges to a war that has reshaped our lives ever since.”
In that context, she said, the coming election should be seen as a decisive moment in which Israeli citizens, wherever they live, have a role to play in determining the country’s future.
“In about three months, the shareholders of this venture, the citizens of Israel, will decide what comes next,” she said. “And that is what we call an election: Israel’s 2026 election.”
Blaish-Sultanik tied the initiative to the broader sense of Israeli responsibility that emerged after October 7, addressing Israelis who live abroad but remain deeply connected to the country.
“To those of us who chose to build their lives elsewhere, but whose hearts belong to Israel. To those of us who got on planes on October 7 and came home to fight for Israel, this is for you,” she said.
She closed by urging Israelis abroad to take part in the vote and encouraging those around them to help spread the message.
“We don’t get to skip that board meeting,” Blaish-Sultanik said. “If you are an Israeli citizen, fly home and vote. If you are not, tell every Israeli on your team, because democracy only works when people show up.”
Written in collaboration with AID Coalition.