Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party and Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar’s New Hope announce that they have signed an agreement to run together on a merged list in the next elections.
The two parties will remain separate entities for the remainder of the current Knesset, but following the next elections, scheduled to take place in 2026, New Hope will be absorbed into Likud, the parties say.
According to Ynet, New Hope will likely be given two spots on the combined list with Likud, one of which will go to Sa’ar and the other to Minister Ze’ev Elkin.
Sa’ar, once a leading Likud minister, quit the party after a failed leadership bid in 2019 and vowed not to work with Netanyahu again in the future.
He nevertheless returned to government as part of the National Unity alliance with Benny Gantz following the October 7, 2023, Hamas onslaught, but then quit in March, returning New Hope to the Opposition.
He returned to government in September and was appointed foreign minister in November.
Polls have consistently shown New Hope falling short of the voter threshold needed to return to the Knesset if elections were held now.
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From the Liveblog of
Thursday, March 13, 2025
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