Controversially, one of those parties is Otzma Yehudit, or Jewish Power, made up of followers of Meir Kahane, an ultranationalist American Israeli rabbi. The Jewish American magazine Forward compared the deal to striking an agreement with Israel’s equivalent of the Ku Klux Klan. Rabbi Rick Jacobs, head of the reform Jewish movement, tweeted that it was “morally outrageous” to imagine that those who had followed Kahane could be welcomed into Netanyahu’s political circle. A poll by the Israeli website Walla on Wednesday predicted that a merger between Lapid and Gantz would bring them virtually neck-and-neck with Netanyahu. The poll projected the combined team would win 34 seats in parliament compared to 33 for Netanyahu’s ticket.

Source: Washington Post February 21, 2019 09:45 UTC