The New Economic Party

The cost of living is the party's central issue. Its evidence is a published platform and many statements; it has no record of votes.

• Formal commitment: The current platform calls for removing all customs duties on food and all import quotas, banning exclusive importers from taking over the import of major manufacturers, dismantling the agricultural production boards (milk, eggs, honey and others), and declaring all exclusive importers, especially of food, pharmaceuticals and cosmetics, as monopolies so that competition law applies to them ^[3]. It calls for re-enacting what it calls "the European law" banning monopolies from charging excessive prices, which it says was emptied of content by the government and the Supreme Court; stopping approvals of mergers; and lowering the fees on class-action lawsuits ^[3].
• Formal commitment: The platform proposes cutting VAT from 18% to 17% in the first year and then by one point a year to 12%, cutting the top marginal income tax rate (including National Insurance and health tax) from 50% to 40% over five years, cutting the combined tax on company profits and dividends from 50% to 40%, and repealing the surplus-profits tax and the "trapped profits" law, which it says discriminate against small businesses. It says this would be funded mainly by ending tax benefits and support for large companies and by "massive" efficiency savings in the state budget, including closing ministries it says were opened for political reasons ^[3].
• Formal commitment: On kosher certification, the platform says kashrut is "very important in a Jewish state" but raises food prices, and proposes privatising it so that any rabbi certified as a rabbi can give kashrut services, under government supervision ^[3].
• Formal commitment: On banking, the platform proposes a new private bank co-funded by the state and run by a foreign bank's management, re-establishing state-backed credit funds for small businesses, requiring banks to pay interest on current-account balances, moving public complaints about banks from the Bank of Israel to the Consumer Protection Authority, and a stronger Supervisor of Banks ^[3]. On cars it proposes splitting exclusive car importers so that one importer cannot hold several brands, banning car importers from owning garages, and limiting price gaps between fleet buyers and private buyers ^[38].
• Formal commitment: The 2021 platform, re-filed for 2022, also called for price supervision of natural gas and breaking up the gas monopoly, separating Bezeq's infrastructure from its subsidiaries, moving the Standards Institution into the Finance Ministry and aligning Israeli standards with the EU, and a fund to cut municipal tax (arnona) for street shops ^[4].
• Statement: In September 2026 Zelekha said he would "cancel all import quotas", bar local monopoly producers from controlling imports, "break up the exclusive importers" and subsidise farmers directly, and promised to save every family NIS 30,000 a year during his term, starting with food prices ^[7]. He said his first coalition demand is the post of Finance Minister, "the only way to lower the cost of living" ^[9]. He also proposed annual one-point cuts in VAT and income tax and repealing the trapped-profits law and the surplus-profits tax ^[26].
• Statement: On banks, he said in September 2026 that taxing bank profits is not the answer because without competition the cost passes to the public, and that he wants "to break the power of the banks" ^[45].
• Formal commitment (support for some groups): Alongside competition and tax cuts, the platform includes direct support: a social safety net and credit fund for the self-employed, larger old-age allowances (especially for elderly people below the poverty line), more welfare and mental-health staff, and subsidised daycare ^{[3, 46, 47]}. It also proposes direct subsidies to farmers north of Hadera and south of Gedera to offset the removal of import duties ^[48].

Closest option(s): Opening the market to competition and imports and breaking up dominant companies (open-market-competition-imports), combined with cutting taxes and government spending (cut-taxes-and-government-spending). The party also proposes some state regulation (declaring importers monopolies, gas price supervision) and targeted support, but its main stated means are competition and tax cuts.

Little specific evidence exists. No statement by the party or Zelekha on the July 2026 government plan to bring the Shin Bet (Israel's internal security service) into the fight against crime organisations, or on holding suspects without trial, was found.

• Formal commitment: The 2021 platform, re-filed for 2022, lists under internal security "eradicating violence in Arab society, strengthening community policing, fighting agricultural crime, the black economy and black money, and treating youth at risk of crime and drugs" ^[4]. The same platform proposes closing gaps between Jewish and non-Jewish communities through differential education budgets, more representation in state institutions, technological education and access to higher education, and encouraging housing projects in the periphery and in Arab and Bedouin communities ^[4].
• Formal commitment: The current women's platform page calls for more police staff trained to deal with violence against women and opposes violence in the name of "family honour" ^[49].
• Statement: In September 2026 Zelekha said "most of Israel's Arabs are loyal citizens" and that he opposes incitement against them, while saying the Arab parties hold an agenda of Israel's enemies. He said Arab citizens should do national service "in public government services" ^[9]. He has also said he will not sit with Arab parties (see Coalition stance) ^[45].

Closest option(s): The evidence is thin, dates mainly from 2021 and does not let one option be picked with confidence. The 2021 platform's one line on policing (community policing and enforcement) together with its proposals for closing gaps in Arab communities points, if anything, to a mix of policing under normal law (more-police-resources-normal-law) and investment in Arab communities (invest-in-arab-communities-first); it does not say whether either comes first. There is no documented position on the Shin Bet plan or on detention without trial.

The party has a formal platform statement and several statements by Zelekha; it has no record of votes.

• Formal commitment: The current security platform says the party "will oppose any withdrawal or concession, even the smallest, from the territories of the State of Israel", arguing that the October 7 attack showed that any withdrawal from an area under Israeli control invites a hostile state ^[6]. It says the party will oppose any arrangement in Gaza that does not include ending what it describes as incitement against Jews and Israel in Gaza's schools, "exactly as the US did in Germany and Japan after World War II", and that this must be the first condition of any arrangement "whether by Arab states, an international body or local control (that is not Hamas)" ^[6].
• Formal commitment: The same page opposes entry permits for Palestinian workers from Judea and Samaria and calls for building without them, using more foreign workers ^[6].
• Statement: In an August 2025 column Zelekha wrote that the population of Gaza "refuses to surrender", to abandon Hamas, to free the hostages or to disarm, and that "as long as we do not dismantle by force the rest of the terror army in Gaza City and the central camps", it would only be a matter of time before Hamas attacked again from Gaza and from Judea and Samaria ^[50]. He called on Israel to press the leaders of Reform UK and the UK Conservative Party, and conservative parties in Canada, Australia and New Zealand, to commit publicly to reversing recognition of a Palestinian state once in power ^[50].
• Statement: In October 2024 Zelekha proposed changing international aid to Gaza (and Judea and Samaria): stopping funding for UNRWA, and instead subsidising machinery and equipment for local factories and credit for small businesses, under an investment administration with Israeli participation and close accounting supervision, with the aim of economic independence for Gaza within about 20 years and reducing the incentive for armed conflict ^[39].
• No statement was found on the October 2025 ceasefire, the US plan's international security force or further IDF withdrawals.

Closest option(s): The evidence points to defeating Hamas militarily and keeping security in Israeli hands, with a non-Hamas local administration and no withdrawal (defeat-hamas-then-security-control), and partly to holding current positions without further withdrawal until Hamas is disarmed (hold-positions-disarmament-first). The platform's acceptance of an arrangement run by Arab states or an international body, on conditions, means the party does not rule out parts of advance-international-arrangement. No position on resettling Gaza or on encouraging emigration from Gaza was found.

This is one of the two core issues of the joint list. The evidence is a formal platform and repeated statements.

• Formal commitment: The current security platform says "the Haredi public must enlist, exactly as the secular and religious-Zionist public enlists". It limits exemptions to equal criteria such as physical and mental health, outstanding athletes and people with special skills, and to "at most 2,000 yeshiva students", described as genuine young Torah prodigies who pass exams set by rabbis. It says the state should not support or subsidise institutions of any kind where people who have not enlisted study, and should not give them allowances or benefits of any kind, and that "anyone who does not enlist will face personal punishment" ^[6].
• Formal commitment: The party's Haredi-integration page proposes state-Haredi schools, technology-skills centres, academic programmes in Haredi women's seminaries, expanding civilian national service and community service, and requiring Haredi men aged 18–22 to give monthly community service hours in return for vouchers for academic studies ^[51]. (This page reads as an employment programme and does not state how it fits with the enlistment section.)
• Formal commitment (joint list): Hendel and Zelekha agreed that a universal enlistment law must be passed before a government is formed ^{[19, 24]}.
• Statement: In September 2026 Zelekha named "a full enlistment law for everyone, for every Jew" as his second condition for joining a coalition, with Arab citizens doing national service in public government services. He said Jews should serve "except Torah geniuses — 500 or 800 such, but real ones, not everyone who sits in a yeshiva" ^[9]. He said the list would offer extensive rewards to those who serve, including Haredim, and that clear, transparent and equal criteria for exempting outstanding Torah scholars should be set together with Haredi society and under public supervision ^[26].
• Statement: In April 2026 he wrote that added budget money for yeshivas whose students do not enlist was "an illegal injustice" that he hoped the next government would stop ^[52].
• Change over time: The current platform caps exemptions at 2,000 yeshiva students ^[6]; in September 2026 Zelekha spoke of 500 or 800 ^[9]. The 2021 platform did not include a compulsory-enlistment section; it focused on Haredi employment, core studies and expanding civilian national service ^[4].

Closest option(s): Compulsory service for all, with a small number of exemptions for outstanding Torah scholars and loss of state benefits for those who refuse (universal-service-with-sanctions). This matches the platform closely.

The party argues that home prices rise because of weak economic growth and investor demand, not because too few homes are built.

• Formal commitment: The current platform says the party aims to bring average home prices down gradually to about 120 average monthly salaries, through economic policy that speeds up growth and so creates alternative investments that draw investors out of the housing market. It says programmes such as "zero VAT" and "Mechir LaMishtaken" (the government's discounted-price apartment programme) failed to lower prices ^[3].
• Statement: In a December 2024 column Zelekha wrote that the claim that "not enough is being built" is a "spin by interested parties". He argued that the government had raised construction from 40,000–50,000 to 60,000–70,000 homes a year while prices still rose, that Israel has about 200,000 empty apartments, and that the cause is "artificial demand" resulting from weak growth ^[53]. In April 2025 he wrote that returning to the policy of his Treasury years, centred on fighting monopolies, cutting taxes and growth, was the way to bring prices down ^[54]. He has also argued that high growth requires higher interest rates and that the two together restrain home prices ^[55].
• Formal commitment: The platform proposes transferring ownership of public-housing apartments to about 60,000 families who have lived in them for decades, and increasing rent assistance for those eligible for public housing ^{[4, 46]}. The 2021 platform supported housing projects in the periphery and in Arab and Bedouin communities, and urban renewal in the periphery ^[4].
• Statement: In April 2026 he criticised the 2026 budget for not including, among other things, "a fair rent law" ^[52]. In the same month he proposed a plan for the north that includes a high-speed rail line to the centre, incentives for high-tech centres in the Galilee, a hospital and university in Kiryat Shmona, and culture and sports investment ^[56].
• Fact-check: Zelekha says home prices fell only during his term as Accountant General (2003–2007). A Globes fact-check in September 2026 found that the price index did fall in 2003, 2004 and 2006, and that prices relative to household income were 3.4% lower at the end of his term than at its start, but that prices had also fallen before his term, and rated the claim "not true". The party responded with its own calculation ^[57].

Closest option(s): The party's main housing argument (growth and competition will draw investors out of housing) does not match any option closely. It explicitly rejects the view that building more is the main answer (speed-up-planning-and-construction). Its secondary proposals are closest to developing the periphery and transport (develop-periphery-and-transport), with some elements of state-led housing support (transferring public housing to tenants, a fair rent law; partly state-led-affordable-rental). The evidence is mixed.

The evidence consists of Zelekha's columns and statements; the party platform does not address Iran or Lebanon specifically.

• Statement: In a June 2026 column, after the US-brokered ceasefire with Iran, Zelekha wrote that the war "despite its many tactical achievements, ended in failure", blaming US President Trump for signing a ceasefire and a memorandum "behind Israel's back" while Iran was weeks from economic collapse. He criticised Prime Minister Netanyahu for going to war alongside the US without agreed options for every scenario ^[58].
• Statement: In the same column he proposed that Israel "change its approach" from relying only on military strikes and work covertly to deepen Iran's internal economic crisis, for example by spreading counterfeit Iranian currency to fuel hyperinflation, cyber-attacks on small banks and disrupting production bottlenecks, to increase the chance that the regime falls. He also called for continuing "surgical" strikes against people involved in building a nuclear bomb, "even if we are left alone in this effort", and wrote that only the regime's collapse would end Iran's nuclear aspirations ^[58].
• Statement: In September 2025 he wrote that most of the public in the Western countries recognising a Palestinian state sees recognition as a reward for Palestinian terror, and that Israel can withstand European economic pressure ^[59].
• Formal commitment: The security platform calls for restoring defence spending, saying it fell from 7% of GDP during his Treasury years to 5% before October 7 and that the IDF was short of ground divisions, helicopter squadrons and equipment ^[6].
• No statement was found on Hezbollah, the 2026 ground operation in southern Lebanon or the handover of areas to the Lebanese army.

Closest option(s): Tentatively, continued pressure on Iran until the threat is removed, including acting alone and without relying on the US-Iran agreements (military-pressure-until-threats-removed), but with an emphasis on covert economic means and targeted strikes rather than open warfare. This rests on Zelekha's own columns (Statements), not on a party document, and covers Iran only; no position on Hezbollah or Lebanon, which the option also covers, was found.

• Formal commitment: The current security platform says the party will oppose the establishment of a Palestinian state and "any withdrawal or concession, even the smallest, from the territories of the State of Israel". It says settlement in Judea and Samaria, as in all parts of Israel, contributes to Israel's security, and that the party will support strengthening Jewish settlement in Judea and Samaria, the Negev, the Galilee and the Golan Heights ^[6].
• Formal commitment: It demands that the Palestinian Authority, which runs Area A of Judea and Samaria, reform its school system and stop what the party calls incitement against Israel, and it opposes entry permits for Palestinian workers from Judea and Samaria ^[6].
• Statement: In August and September 2025 Zelekha wrote that Israel should work for the reversal of Western recognition of a Palestinian state, and that most of the public in those countries sees recognition as a reward for Palestinian terror ^{[50, 59]}.
• No platform clause or statement was found on applying Israeli sovereignty to all or part of Judea and Samaria.
• Change over time: The 2021 platform, re-filed for 2022, did not address Judea and Samaria or a Palestinian state ^[4]; the current security page does ^[6].

Closest option(s): The documented positions (no Palestinian state, no withdrawal, strengthening settlements) match keeping the current situation while strengthening settlements (maintain-current-situation). The party has not stated a position on applying sovereignty, so full-sovereignty and partial-sovereignty-area-c cannot be confirmed or excluded.

• Statement (formal setting): In remarks to the Knesset Constitution, Law and Justice Committee on 31 January 2023, published by the party as its position, Zelekha called for "broad agreement" on any change to the judicial system so that each new government does not change the system, while saying such agreement cannot give a veto to keeping a system he criticised ^[41]. The text comes from the party; the official committee transcript could not be reached (see Information availability). An independent interview with Arutz Sheva in February 2023 reports the same main points: he said he had proposed in the Constitution Committee the proportional-majority override mechanism described below, that the judicial-selection committee should be widened with both coalition and opposition representatives rather than controlled by the government alone, and that the changes "must pass with broad agreement" ^[75].
  • He said he did not support the bill then proposed by committee chair MK Simcha Rothman giving the government full control of judicial appointments, and favoured "a more balanced mechanism" giving a wide role to the opposition, lawyers, academia and the judges themselves; but he supported changing the existing system, which he said had not produced judges representing all parts of society ^[41].
  • On the override clause (a law letting the Knesset re-enact a law the Supreme Court struck down), he proposed that the Supreme Court could strike down a law only with a full panel and by a larger proportional majority than the one by which the Knesset passed it, and that the Knesset could then re-enact it with at least 61 votes and a larger proportional majority than the court's, and so on until the process ends. He said he "strongly opposes" Rothman's bill, which he said would remove the courts' involvement in legislation and government actions ^[41].
  • He argued that government legal advisers are not truly independent and suggested that their posts be treated openly as positions of trust ^[41].
  • He also criticised the courts for, in his view, interpreting competition laws in favour of monopolies, and for weak enforcement of contracts ^[41].
• Statement: In May 2026 Zelekha wrote that very high trust in institutions among the governing camp and total distrust among the opposition "may allow the government to expand its powers and harm democracy", and that a healthy democracy needs "high social trust and moderate institutional scepticism" ^[60].
• Formal commitment: The 2021 platform said the party would "act to preserve and protect the basic principles of the democratic regime" ^[4].

Closest option(s): Agreed rules through broad compromise, including a limited, mutual override mechanism and a more balanced judicial-selection committee (broad-agreed-constitutional-framework). This rests mainly on the January 2023 committee remarks as published by the party and on the matching February 2023 interview; no statement was found on the 2025 judicial-selection law.

• Statement: In an interview published in September 2026, Zelekha said "a state commission of inquiry should be established here" with strong powers, including the ability to bring criminal charges and to demand any document from the army, the government and the Finance Ministry, and that it should investigate "from the prime minister to the last minister, from the chief of staff to the last commander in the field" ^[26].
• Statement: In the same interview he said: "I do not trust the President of the Supreme Court to appoint the members of this commission. We need to find another constellation", in which the members would be people "the whole people of Israel" accepts, who are not political and who had no part in the conduct of the army and the state before October 7. He cited low public trust in the Supreme Court president ^[26].
• No formal party document on the inquiry was found.

Closest option(s): A commission with full powers whose members are chosen by a mechanism no political side controls, rather than by the Supreme Court president (commission-chosen-by-neutral-mechanism). Zelekha did not specify the mechanism.

The party has published few positions on religion and state. The evidence is limited to kashrut, Haredi education and some 2021 platform items.

• Formal commitment: The platform calls for privatising kashrut certification: taking it out of the government's hands and letting any rabbi certified as a rabbi provide kashrut services, under state supervision, while describing kashrut as "very important in a Jewish state" ^{[3, 4]}.
• Formal commitment: The party proposes state-Haredi schools, in cooperation with the Education Ministry and local authorities, and rewarding Haredi institutions that teach core subjects ^{[4, 51]}.
• Formal commitment: The current women's page opposes gender segregation in the public space and says the party will act to prevent segregated public events and legislation that would expand it ^[49]. The same page says the party will act to correct "the built-in inequality in family law", to end the "race of jurisdictions" (between the rabbinical and civil courts) and to promote solutions for agunot and women refused a get (women whose husbands will not grant a religious divorce) ^[49]; the 2021 platform also called for correcting this inequality ^[4]. Neither document proposes civil marriage.
• Formal commitment: The 2021 platform supported legislation for full equal rights for the LGBT community, amending the adoption law to let same-sex couples adopt, and a surrogacy law that includes the LGBT community ^[4]. These items do not appear on the current website.
• Dated background (2020; statement): When founding the party in December 2020, Zelekha criticised Gideon Sa'ar, as former interior minister, for choosing "to close businesses on Shabbat instead of reducing the crazy municipal tax they pay" ^[2].
• No position was found on civil marriage, conversion, Shabbat public transport or the Chief Rabbinate's role in marriage.

Closest option(s): The documented positions (competition in kashrut among certified rabbis, opposing gender segregation, changes in family law for agunot, LGBT equality in 2021) lean toward keeping the Rabbinate but allowing alternatives (more-choice-local-decisions). The evidence is limited: it does not cover civil marriage, conversion or Shabbat transport, and the kashrut proposal opens certification to rabbis certified as rabbis rather than to non-Orthodox bodies.

• Formal commitment: Beyond VAT and income-tax cuts (see Cost of living), the platform proposes freezing the accrual of new rights under budgetary (state-funded) pensions, appointing an external audit firm to review exemptions from public tenders, cancelling tender exemptions that it says were expanded under Ehud Olmert and Avigdor Liberman, and moving expensive infrastructure projects from government companies to joint management with the private sector ^[3].
• Statement: In April 2026 Zelekha criticised the 2026 state budget as containing "not a trace" of measures against the cost of living, home prices or bank charges, and criticised coalition funds as "corrupt" ^[52].

• Formal commitment: Pension policy: restoring fast growth so that long-term interest rates rise, bringing the banks back into competition in the pension market to push down management fees, and setting a maximum market share for any pension body ^[61].
• Formal commitment: Compulsory financial education from primary school, covering budgeting, credit and interest, investments, pay slips, taxes, pensions and workers' rights ^[47].

• Statement: Zelekha supports the right of workers to organise, citing Adam Smith, but distinguishes committees in competitive companies from those in monopolies (he names Israel Railways, Ashdod Port and the Airports Authority), which he says can hold the public hostage ^[62]. The party's director-general describes the same distinction ^[5].
• Background: Globes reported in January 2021 that after leaving the Treasury Zelekha had given paid advice to the Histadrut and to workers' committees, including those of Israel Aerospace Industries and the Haifa Port company ^[34]. The party says his advice to the Histadrut chair covered four issues only and that he has opposed committees in monopolies such as those at Ashdod Port, the Airports Authority and Israel Railways ^[35].

• Formal commitment: Lower VAT and income tax, lower municipal tax for small businesses, an economic safety net for the self-employed similar to that of employees, a credit fund for small businesses and less regulation ^[3]. The 2021 platform also proposed gradually equalising the rights of the self-employed with those of employees and institutionalising aid during economic crises or military operations ^[4].

• Formal commitment: Reduce teaching hours and use the savings to cut class sizes to 18 pupils, dismantle much of the Education Ministry's supervisory staff and give school principals wide autonomy and higher pay, review higher-education budgets in favour of engineering, technology and medicine, early-childhood reform and subsidised daycare, and differential funding to promote equal opportunity ^[47].
• Formal commitment: Larger budgets for youth movements through the Youth Movements Law, more places in pre-army service years, welfare funds for youth who cannot afford youth-movement fees, and more civilian service places for young people not designated for IDF service ^[63].

• Formal commitment: Raise national health spending gradually to 8% of GDP with equal treatment for mental health, add doctor and nurse positions and raise the pay of interns and residents, build three new hospitals in the northern and southern periphery, open a new medical school, set binding service standards for waiting times, and strengthen emergency medicine in the periphery ^[64].

• Formal commitment: Larger budgets for people with disabilities, higher old-age allowances especially for elderly people below the poverty line, transferring public-housing apartments to their tenants, more welfare and mental-health staff, a national financial and digital education programme for the elderly, and a national scholarship fund for young people in the periphery ^[46]. The 2021 platform proposed completing the disability-benefits reform led by a team Zelekha headed in 2017 and allocating NIS 4 billion over four years to raise old-age allowances by NIS 1,000 a month for elderly people living only on National Insurance benefits ^[4].

• Formal commitment: A transport cabinet headed by the Finance Minister, reform of the Transport Ministry, moving large infrastructure projects to franchise tenders with the private sector under the supervision of government companies, more public transport especially in the periphery, shared and smart transport, and action against road accidents ^[65]. On cars: splitting exclusive importers, banning cross-ownership of importers and garages, limiting price gaps between leasing companies and private buyers, and changing the taxation of company cars so that it does not encourage frequent replacement ^[38].

• Formal commitment: A national strategic plan to increase the supply of technology workers, including women, Haredim, Arab citizens and older workers; programmes to help young people in the periphery study high-tech subjects; more periphery youth in the IDF's technology units; and full digitisation of government services ^[66].
• Statement: In April 2026 Zelekha proposed a six-part plan for the north (transport, employment, health, higher education, culture and budgets), funded, he said, by fighting the cost of living ^[56].

• Formal commitment: Declare a climate emergency; renewable-energy targets of 30% of electricity by 2030, 70% by 2040 and 100% by 2050; a NIS 10 billion climate fund; not extending the Dead Sea mineral-extraction concession when it expires in 2030 and rehabilitating the Dead Sea and the Jordan River; closing the Haifa Bay refineries; low-sulphur fuel or electric propulsion for ships in Israeli waters; heavy fines for polluters; more recycling; and indoor air-quality monitoring in buildings with more than 20 people ^[67].
• Formal commitment: Support for a bill to phase out live animal shipments to Israel within three years, moving enforcement of the animal cruelty law to the Environmental Protection Ministry, moving to cage-free poultry farming, banning hunting and stronger punishment for animal abuse ^[67].

• Formal commitment: Remove duties and quotas on food and agricultural imports while protecting farmers through direct subsidies (for farmers north of Hadera and south of Gedera), anti-dumping levies, country-of-origin labelling, requiring a monopoly food producer to separate from its import business, and an agrarian reform returning unused agricultural land to farming cooperatives, with compensation ^[48].

• Formal commitment: Harsher punishment for the murder of women by their partners, more shelters and treatment for violent men, special courts and a police unit for sexual offences, equal employment and pay, adequate representation of women in state institutions, gender-equality education from primary school, and preventing gender segregation in the public space ^[49].

• Formal commitment: The platform calls aliyah "a Zionist value of the first order" and proposes local absorption centres, vocational training, fast recognition of foreign professional qualifications, tax incentives to settle in the periphery and a larger absorption basket ^[3].

• Dated background (2007; statement): Zelekha has made fighting public corruption a long-standing theme: as Accountant General he said in January 2007 that Israel was "more corrupt than appears" and called for stronger internal auditors and a State Comptroller who works in real time ^[68]. The party's values page defines corruption broadly, as any decision by a politician or official based on extraneous considerations, including a decision not to act ^[69].

• Formal commitment: The 2021 platform, re-filed for 2022, supported full equal rights for the LGBT community, adoption by same-sex couples, a surrogacy law that includes the LGBT community, and punishment of violence against LGBT people ^[4]. This section does not appear on the current website; no current statement either way was found.