Shas MK: Deri’s leadership is like the Islamic State

An unnamed Shas MK who claimed to speak on behalf of his party launched a personal attack on party chairman Aryeh Deri and voiced his support for former chairman Eli Yishai, according to a report in a Hebrew newspaper Sunday.

Yisahi, who recently left Shas, led the ultra-Orthodox party for 14 years, but found himself sidelined by Deri’s 2011 return as party leader after serving two years in prison for embezzlement and an extended hiatus from politics.

“I see Deri as the head of Shas, and it bothers me, and the rest of us. I wish there was something I could do to return Eli Yishai in his place,” the unnamed party member told NRG.

The long-standing rivalry between Deri and Yishai was reignited after the death of Shas spiritual leader Rabbi Ovadia Yosef last year. The two quarreled repeatedly over Yishai’s role in the party, with Deri accusing Yishai of undermining him in a bid to reclaim the chairmanship.

“Yishai represents loyalty and honesty, whereas Deri has completely different values,” the MK said.

The party member also accused Deri of forcing Yishai out of the party and said the move would cost Shas tens of thousands of votes in the upcoming elections. He said that Deri gets rid of anyone who challenges his authority and likened his leadership style to that of the Mafia or the Islamic State.

“Aryeh equals idolatry, he is the Antiochus of our generation,” he said, invoking the villain of the Hanukkah story. “He wants everyone to bow down to him like a king.”

Political discourse between ultra-Orthodox lawmakers often invokes biblical imagery. In 2013, Shas’s Rabbi Shalom Cohen labeled Israel’s national religious movement “Amalek,” the mythical enemy of the Jewish people.

“No one believes [Deri], not even the party’s senior members,” said the MK, who claimed to speak on behalf of the entire ultra-Orthodox party except for MKs Isaac Cohen and Yoav Ben Tzur.

The MK also said that Deri’s views were not supported by the majority of party members, and said that they are regularly forced to sign statements they do not agree with. “Deri brought [the] Oslo [agreements with the Palestinians] upon us; he represents the left, not Shas,” he said.

Last Monday, when Yishai formally unveiled his new party, Ha’am Itanu, Shas-affiliated activists burst into the press conference chanting, “Traitor!” The activists broke into the hall and grabbed a portrait of Rabbi Ovadia Yosef that was placed near the podium.

A poll published earlier this month by Maariv, and conducted by the Panels research group before Yishai’s resignation, predicted that under Deri’s leadership, Shas would win seven Knesset seats in the 2015 elections, as opposed to nine under Yishai’s leadership.

The poll also found that in the case of a split in the party, Deri’s faction would win four seats, while Yishai’s would win five, with both leaders making it over the 3.25-percent electoral threshold.