What started as a brilliant political "exit" has turned into a battle of survival for the New Right. Still, two days before the Knesset election, it looks like party co-founders Ayelet Shaked and Naftali Bennett will make it to the finish line, even if they win fewer seats than they expected to.
When they launched their party, everything looked different. Three months ago, the dynamic duo of Israeli politics announced that they were leaving Habayit Hayehudit to establish a new party, and polls soon confirmed that the step had been worthwhile.
But potential voters soon grew bored with their new toy. Other players occupied the surprise slot in the campaign – namely far-right activist Moshe Feiglin, who pushed to legalize cannabis, drawing voters away from the New Right.
Bennett and Shaked put together an all-stars party list. But then the party they had abandoned to its fate got a second wind. The new leader of Habayit Hayehudi, Rabbi Rafi Peretz, and head of National Union joined forces and started to fight back, calling their joint Knesset list the Union of Right-Wing Parties.
Bennett and Shaked made mistakes with their campaign. Bennett took a harsher tone against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on security and defense issues, and it looked as if he was trying too hard. And Shaked put out a parody of an ad for a fragrance called "Fascism," but no one thought it was funny.
Despite these missteps, the bottom didn't fall out of the New Right's voter base. The hard-core voters to the right of the Likud, both religious and secular, which believes that a conservative, right-wing worldview shouldn't remain merely philosophy but should be implemented at a ministerial level, stayed with them.
Polls show that the party, which at one point was hovering barely over the minimum electoral threshold of 3.25% (four Knesset seats) has regained some of its strength. Netanyahu's failed policy on Hamas – there is no other way of characterizing it – apparently restored some the votes the New Right had lost.
Until the polling places open on April 9, the New Right will have to keep taking aim at everyone else: Feiglin, the Union of Right-Wing Parties, Netanyahu, and even Blue and White leader Benny Gantz to cross the finish line successfully.
The real value of the 2019 election's start-up will be determined only after all the votes are in and counted.
