Amid speculation of merger, Eisenkot and Liberman say they’re ‘deepening cooperation’

Yashar and Yisrael Beytenu party heads hold meeting; Yair Golan urges Eisenkot to join either with his Democrats or Bennett and Lapid’s Together party

Following recent reports that Gadi Eisenkot, head of the nascent Yashar party, and Yisrael Beytenu chief Avigdor Liberman are in talks on a potential merger, the two politicians announced on Thursday that they are working to expand cooperation ahead of the upcoming election, but did not confirm any plans to run on a unified slate.

In a joint statement, the two opposition parties said that Eisenkot and Liberman met last night and that both had “instructed their teams to deepen the cooperation between the parties in order to lead the ‘coalition of those who serve [in the military]’ to victory and establish a Zionist, statesmanlike government.”

A union between the centrist, recently formed Yashar and the hawkish Yisrael Beytenu — which currently holds six seats in the Knesset but has been consistently polling at about 10 — could yield a combined 25 seats, according to recent surveys, bringing it neck-and-neck with former prime minister Naftali Bennett and Opposition Leader Yair Lapid’s Together slate.

Responding to a reporter’s question about a possible merger during a press conference earlier this week, Eisenkot answered that he and Liberman have “maintained a long relationship” and have met and spoken in recent months, but that he did not want to get into specifics.

Liberman was also asked about the matter at a press conference on Wednesday, and said the primary goal of the upcoming election is to replace Netanyahu’s government and that “any move that brings an added value of two or three mandates is necessary. But there must be added value. If a move doesn’t contribute to adding mandates, then in my view, it’s a waste of time.”

During the same press conference, Liberman said that while he will not sit in a government with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, he is open to entering a coalition including a post-Netanyahu Likud party if it embraces certain policies — something it is unlikely to do.

In order for him to sit with Likud sans Netanyahu, the party would have to accept key parts of his platform, which includes prime ministerial term limits, a prohibition on running for prime minister while under indictment, a state commission of inquiry into Hamas’s onslaught of October 7, 2023, and public transportation on Shabbat, Liberman said.

Liberman and his allies have recently billed their party as the true successor of the old, pre-Netanyahu Likud party.

Liberman also called for a national referendum on a constitution within the next government’s first six months, should the opposition win the upcoming 2026 election.

A call to consolidate the opposition

Eisenkot and Liberman’s announcement came on the heels of an appeal by The Democrats party chair Yair Golan, who called on Eisenkot to merge with either his Democrats party or former prime minister Naftali Bennett’s Together party, rather than attempting an independent run in the upcoming elections.

“This moment is bigger than all of us… Splitting the [anti-government] bloc does not bring new votes; it just disperses the strength we have and weakens our political camp,” Golan declared during a speech at the Berl Katznelson Foundation on Thursday.

“I call on you not to further divide the bloc and to come to a decision that will allow us to win: join the Bennett-Lapid alliance, or join us, the Democrats, and strengthen the ideological and moral home of the liberal camp. Victory in the elections, and saving the state, depend on our ability to stand strong together,” Golan said in a message directed at Eisenkot.

Aside from pushing for consolidation within the opposition bloc, Golan this week also urged fellow Zionist opposition leaders to again partner with the Arab Ra’am party and “stop playing along” with what he termed the demonization by the coalition of the Islamist faction, so that they can “topple this failed government of disaster.”

Last week, Lapid told Bennett that he was willing to take third place, rather than second, on their joint electoral slate if it would help secure a merger with Eisenkot, a source close to Lapid said.

A source close to Eisenkot dismissed Lapid’s offer to join the new union despite the fact that Eisenkot was first reported to have proposed such a merger in January.

Eisenkot said Tuesday that he had “worked for many months to create an infrastructure for victory in the elections” and, in pursuit of this goal, had “met with all the candidates and tried to reach a three-way structure because I thought that was the right solution, and it did not work out.”

As such, “I continued to strengthen Yashar to be as large as possible,” he told reporters in Tel Aviv on Tuesday.

According to a Channel 12 poll released last week, in the event that Eisenkot would join Bennett and Lapid on a single ticket, their united party would garner 41 seats, but the overall balance of the blocs would remain unaffected.