Will the ultra-right seize control of religious Zionism in Israel?
With Naftali Bennett and Ayelet Shaked having left HaBayit HaYehudi to start a new party, ultra-right parties are angling to take control of Israel's religious Zionist movement.
HaBayit HaYehudi was formed in 2008 through a political alliance of the National Religious Party (Mafdal) and the National Union Party. The arrangement was not beneficial until the arrival of Naftali Bennett and Ayelet Shaked, when under their leadership HaBayit HaYehudi, known in English as the Jewish Home party, won 12 Knesset seats in the 2012 elections.
On Dec. 29, 2018, Bennett and Shaked announced that they were leaving HaBayit HaYehudi to establish another party, the New Right. Their departure left HaBayit HaYehudi a flock without a shepherd and at risk of falling off Israel's political map. This uncertainty has led parties on the far right of the map to move to fill the space traditionally occupied by the religious Zionist movement.
