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Thursday, September 3, 2026
Yesh Atid’s Karine Elharrar says she won’t seek reelection, amid wave of departures from party
Add ToI as a Preferred Source on GoogleAriela Karmel is a political correspondent at The Times of Israel. She previously reported for Calcalist and Haaretz. She holds an MA in Middle Eastern and African History from Tel Aviv University and a BA in Political Science from the University of British Columbia.
Yesh Atid MK Karine Elharrar announces that she will not run in the October 27 election, becoming the latest in a wave of Yesh Atid lawmakers to bow out of the race.
“I have decided, following consultations with my family, to move on to a new challenge. I will therefore not run on the Yesh Atid slate for the next Knesset,” says Elharrar.
A founding member of Yesh Atid who has served in the Knesset since 2013, including as energy minister under the Bennett-Lapid government in 2021, the lawmaker stresses that she is not leaving the party.
“I am staying in Yesh Atid because Yesh Atid is my party and my political home,” Elharrar says, adding that she will campaign for the party ahead of the election.
Her announcement follows a wave of Yesh Atid lawmakers who announced in the last week that they would not seek reelection, including fellow founding members Meir Cohen and Mickey Levy, as well as Debbie Biton and Tatiana Mazarsky.
Other former Yesh Atid lawmakers have moved to rival parties, including Elazar Stern, who joined Gadi Eisenkot’s Yashar last month, and Yoav Segalovitz, who announced this week that he will run with Mansour Abbas’s Ra’am.
The departures come as Yesh Atid prepares to receive a reduced share of realistic slots on its joint B’Yachad slate with Naftali Bennett’s party, which has been polling for months at around 13-15 seats. The slate will unveil its candidate list on Sunday, two days before the deadline for parties to submit their final electoral slates.
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