Likud recount could push veteran minister out of Knesset as fraud claims roil party
Etty Atia, backbencher and ally of Likud bigwig Haim Katz, overtakes Gila Gamliel in fresh tally of primary vote; Gamliel says Katz trying to 'steal' vote, files police complaint
A recount of votes in the Likud primaries could alter the party’s electoral slate and push Science and Technology Minister Gila Gamliel, one of the party’s veteran lawmakers, out of the Knesset, as allegations of vote-rigging and irregularities roiled the ruling party on Wednesday.
According to Hebrew media reports, a recount of ballots from the central city of Be’er Yaakov on Tuesday night indicated that backbencher MK Etty Atia, a close political ally of Minister Haim Katz, the Likud Central Committee chairman, had overtaken Gamliel.
That would potentially give Atia the 25th spot on the party slate at the expense of Gamliel, who would be pushed down to the 35th slot. The party is expected to win around 25 seats in the October 27 election, according to recent polls.
Likud was expected to announce the final results on Thursday after considering appeals.
The original results published after last week’s primaries gave Gamliel 22,087 votes to Atia’s 21,633. Due to Likud’s complicated slate rules, including slots reserved for women and an unusually large number of candidates chosen by party leader Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Gamliel was assigned the 25th position while Atia was left further down the list.
Allegations of voter fraud emerged after Atia, along with several sitting ministers, faced the prospect of being left out of the Knesset, prompting the party to examine several polling stations and order a recount in Be’er Yaakov.
After the recount concluded, Katz announced that Atia had received more votes than Gamliel. That prompted Gamliel to make her own allegations of voter fraud.
“Haim Katz will do anything to get Etty Atia in, even at the cost of corruption and the use of illegitimate methods to steal the election,” Gamliel said in an interview with Army Radio on Wednesday.
In response, Katz wrote in a post on X, “If anyone has any complaints, here is the address: Ofek Park, Northern Industrial Zone, 1 Pesach Lev Street, Lod,” which is the address of the police’s Lahav 433 major crimes unit.
Gamliel subsequently filed a police complaint alleging vote-rigging.
Katz’s office issued a statement claiming that Gamliel had initially received 100 percent of the votes in Be’er Yaakov, calling the results “illogical.” He suggested that it was she who orchestrated the fraud, adding that “others who got in on her deal received more votes than the number of voters.”
“She should be asked which of her associates falsified the results. Minister Haim Katz did not interfere and did not falsify anything, and any attempt to make such claims is utter nonsense,” the statement said.
Gamliel is also appealing to Likud’s election court over the recount. Associates of Gamliel cited by Channel 12 alleged that “the count was falsified in the dark.”
One scathing appeal reported by Ynet was written by Gal Yosef, a member of the Likud Central Committee in the Ra’anana branch, and addressed to Netanyahu’s chief of staff Ido Norden, with a request to pass it on to the premier.
“I appeal to you to act immediately to put Minister Haim Katz in his place,” Yosef reportedly wrote. “All his claims about defects in the polling stations are serious slander that will seriously harm Likud and the upcoming election campaign. His entire goal is probably to advance his personal interests illegally. Any attempt by him to harm Minister Gamliel will cause us as a large group to reconsider our path in Likud, and that’s a shame.”