Netanyahu convinces Haredi party backed by rabbi accused of sex offenses to drop out

The Achi (My Brother) party announced Friday that it was dropping out of the election with just four days to go until polls open, amid a push by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his partners for small right-wing and religious factions to quit the race.

Achi was launched as a national party in June by disciples of the late Rabbi Yoram Abergel, from the southern city of Netivot, and its spiritual leader is Abergel’s son Haim Yosef Abergel, head of the late rabbi’s yeshiva network, who was arrested in August last year on suspicion of sexual offenses against young girls.

Ahead of the last municipal elections in 2024, the younger Abergel split with Sephardic ultra-Orthodox party Shas — which is allied with Netanyahu and taken a hardline stance against conscription — over his support for military service and secular studies.

The Ynet news site published video of a phone conversation between Abergel and Netanyahu in which the premier praises him for “truly caring for our people” and referenced an agreement reached between them.

“Those who study Torah, will study, and all the others will enlist. That’s exactly what we agreed on,” Netanyahu can be heard saying, in reference to the highly contentious issue of exemptions to mandatory military service for yeshiva students.

Netanyahu’s Likud party issued a statement noting that it reached a deal with the Achi party to appoint a representative of the party as a deputy minister in the Prime Minister’s Office “to advance our shared principles.”

Achi party was not projected to pass the electoral threshold in any poll.

נתניהו לרב אברג׳ל: הסיכום בנינו – מי שלומד ילמד וכל האחרים יתגייסו pic.twitter.com/LnokEPgoAD

— אבי מוסקוב Avi moskoff (@AviMoskov) October 23, 2026

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Netanyahu has also been heavily pressing Ofer Winter’s People of Israel party and Moti Leitner’s Charedi Public Party to drop out over concerns that votes for the right-wing bloc will go to waste if the parties don’t enter the Knesset. Those parties have steadfastly refused the calls to exit the race, with neither forecast to enter the Knesset in any of the final polls published ahead of Tuesday’s vote.

Arab polling stations

Also Friday, Israeli television reported that Likud was already preparing to challenge results from polling stations in Arab cities and towns before voting has even begun.

According to Channel 12 news, Likud already drew up a number of complaints and allegations of fraud for voting stations in Arab communities.

The party was reportedly readying to challenge women who show up to vote fully veiled as well as allegations that some polling stations have segregated voting times for men and women. The TV channel said such issues were already addressed by Central Elections Commission regulations.

The report came after Likud and Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich’s far-right Religious Zionism party vowed last to send nearly 2,000 activists to polling stations in Arab communities on election day, citing unsubstantiated claims of fraud by voters and vote counters.

The activists will be posted in addition to formal observers that each party can send to polling stations. The additional Likud and Religious Zionism activists will thus have no official function or ability to perform oversight, raising questions as to the purpose of their presence and concerns of potential intimidation of voters.

In June, when Likud lawmakers proposed installing cameras at polling stations to combat fraud, Central Elections Committee Director General Dean Livne said existing safeguards were sufficient.

“There is no fraud in Israel. If it exists, it’s on the margins,” Livne said at the time.

Likud deployed cameras at polling stations in Arab communities in 2019, drawing accusations of attempts to suppress turnout and intimidate voters. On election day in 2015, Netanyahu released a video urging supporters to go vote because “the Arabs are heading to the polls in droves.”