New Right's Bennett to meet URWP's Peretz in ongoing bid to forge alliance

Right-wing parties continue to disagree over who will lead a united slate; Channel 12 reports Peretz has threatened to quit if he loses lead spot — he calls the claim ‘drivel’

The New Right party’s deputy leader Naftali Bennett will meet Sunday with the Union of Right Wing Parties’ chief Rafi Peretz as the sides continue to negotiate an alliance, with five days to go until parties must finalize their rosters for the September 17 election.

The two parties continue to argue over New Right’s demand that party chief Ayelet Shaked lead the joint slate.

Channel 12 news reported that Peretz will also meet with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who wants a union between the parties to prevent any right-wing party from falling below the electoral threshold, leading to the loss of right-wing votes. But Netanyahu has also been reported to be working against the possibility of Shaked leading the alliance.

According to the Ynet news site members of the URWP are pressuring Peretz to cede the no. 1 spot to Shaked, who polls show will win the united list more Knesset seats.

Education Minister Rafi Peretz at his swearing-in ceremony at the Education Ministry in Jerusalem on June 26, 2019. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)

Channel 12 said associates of Peretz have threatened he would retire if he loses the lead spot, but Peretz quickly denied the report as “drivel” and said “I do not intend to abandon my home under any circumstances.”

Meanwhile Ynet also reported that while New Right is demanding four of the first nine seats, the URWP is insisting that they only receive three.

URWP no. 2 Bezalel Smotrich said Friday there was “no way” his slate would not join forces with the New Right party.

He was denying a report by the Kan public broadcaster on Thursday evening that cited senior URWP officials as claiming Netanyahu was trying to convince the URWP alliance — an amalgamation of the Jewish Home, National Union and far-right Otzma Yehudit — to shun New Right.

The report said the premier had offered National Union’s Smotrich and URWP leader Peretz of Jewish Home a series of perks to team up again with Otzma Yehudit, leaving out New Right. The two leaders would retain their current interim positions of transportation and education ministers, respectively, and would both be members of the high-level security cabinet and the forum of coalition heads, while Otzma Yehudit chief Itamar Ben Gvir would be made deputy minister or head of a committee, the report said.

But Smotrich flatly denied the authenticity of the report — which was also denied by Netanyahu — directly addressing Kan reporter Zeev Kam on twitter.

“Hello Zeev, I would be happy to know who those senior officials are,” he wrote. “I’m not senior so maybe this doesn’t count, but I’m not familiar with anything of the sort. There is no way in the world we won’t go together with New Right. That would be an irresponsible risk for the State of Israel, and I’m convinced Netanyahu and also our partners in the Jewish Home know that. The same is true of New Right, I believe.”

Ayelet Shaked speaks at a press conference in Ramat Gan on July 21, 2019, after she is announced as the new head of the New Right party. (Tomer Neuberg/Flash90)

Shaked, who earlier this week took the reins of the New Right, has been pushing for the URWP to merge with her party for a joint Knesset run in order to avoid the factions splitting the right-wing bloc and risking one of them not clearing the electoral threshold. In April’s election, New Right fell several thousand votes short of entering the Knesset, despite polls showing it getting as many as six seats. URWP won five seats.

In a Facebook post Friday, Shaked said gaps remained between sides the sides “but they are not large” and called on Peretz and Smotrich “to make every effort” in order to seal a unity pact.

On Thursday Shaked backed off a demand that New Right be given every second slot on a united right-wing slate, urging Jewish Home and other factions to rally behind her.

“Establishing a right-wing bloc is an urgent matter, a kind of large republican party with a broad range of views to the right of Likud,” Shaked said to the press outside her home in Tel Aviv.

She added that she was also hoping to forge alliances with Otzma Yehudit and the quasi-libertarian Zehut party.

Transportation Minister and Head of the National Union party Betzalel Smotrich speaks during a conference Ariel University in the West Bank on June 20, 2019. (Sraya Diamant/Flash90)

Otzma Yehudit joined the URWP for the April vote but has since said it was breaking its partnership with Jewish Home in a dispute over who should fill the five seats the URWP won.

Three polls published on Thursday evening gave New Right between nine and 11 Knesset seats, compared with just four for URWP.

Michael Bachner contributed to this report.