The current mayor of Givat Shmuel and former CEO of the religious-Zionist Jewish Home party, Yossi Brodny, joined MK Avigdor Liberman’s Yisrael Beytenu on Tuesday, the party announced.
The move has political significance in the behind-the-scenes political jostling as to who will lead the anti-Netanyahu right-wing camp in the next election.
Brodny, 53, has served since 2008 as mayor of Givat Shmuel, a city known for its large religious-Zionist population. In the 2022 election, Brodny was second in the Yamina-Jewish Home party led by Ayelet Shaked, which did not pass the electoral threshold. Ahead of the April 2019 election, Brodny was a leading candidate to lead Jewish Home’s Knesset list, but the party eventually chose Raffi Peretz.
Between 2003-2008, Brodny led the young faction within the Mafdal, the former name of the Jewish Home. However, after becoming Givat Shmuel’s mayor, he joined the Likud and remained a Likud member for over a decade.
Boost support and challenge Bennett
Liberman’s hawkish security views have led to a steady rise in polls since the ongoing war began in October. Brodny’s choice to join Liberman indicates the latter’s attempt to shake off his anti-religious reputation in order to expand his voter base and take voters away from Liberman’s main competitor as the next leader of the anti-Netanyahu right-wing camp – former prime minister Naftali Bennett.
While Brodny is well known in political circles, however, he does not have much national name recognition. Liberman’s choice of Brodny, and not a higher-profile religious-Zionist representative, could indicate his difficulty in convincing religious Zionist voters to support him.
Bennett, according to a source close to the matter, had already decided to run in the next election. Shaked has not yet made a decision.
