Sneak Peek: Amit on why Netanyahu’s Party is shrinking while Israelis shift to the right, and more…

**Dan Senor** (0:00)
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**Amit Segal** (0:46)
You are listening to an Ark Media podcast.

**Dan Senor** (0:58)
Welcome to Inside Call Me Back, our members-only edition where we open the door and let you shape the conversation. Today in the hot seat addressing your questions and personal dilemmas is Ark Media contributor Amit Segal. Okay, let's jump into our questions from our subscribers here. The first is from Ellie from Hoboken, New Jersey, who writes, Hi Dan and team, love the show, first time caller.
My question, since October 7th, while Israelis have moved quite strongly to the right, Netanyahu's Likud party is pulling at around 22 seats, shrinking down from the existing 32 What is the single biggest reason for that?

**Amit Segal** (1:38)
Okay, so first of all, 22, 21 seats, 23 is give or take the average on the mainstream media polls. We still have to bear in mind that on channel 14 and channel 24, the right-leaning Charles Netanyahu enjoys something between 28 and 32
If Netanyahu is actually polling around 22, the main reason is disillusioned voters who think that this government was a failure, in terms of the ultra-orthodox question, in terms of the inability to actually decisively win in each and every front, and what I would call a Likud fatigue, which means that, with one exception, for a year and a half, Likud has been around in office since 2009 and with another punctuation since 1996
So it makes sense that people are quite tired and that they still haven't found any reason to rush into the ballots, in droves. Why? Because, maybe because they got used to the fact that Netanyahu always wins. Maybe because they don't want him to win anymore. And maybe because they are angry. I would offer to be quite cautious about the number, because 90 days prior to the 2015 election, Netanyahu scored around the very same number, and the atmosphere was very dark, and there was a lot of bitterness in the air, and it ended up with Netanyahu's most dramatic victory in the current century. So it's too early, but Netanyahu's main mission is not to talk Likud voters into not voting for Eisencourt, but to talk to them to get out of their homes and go to vote.

**Dan Senor** (3:21)
Okay, and if right-wing voters are moving away from Likud, Amit, this relates to all the major parties. When there's like a bleed from a major party, to the extent that bleed is attracted to these smaller parties, as you get closer and closer to the election, there's a reversion to the major parties.

**Amit Segal** (3:37)
In Hebrew, you call it to drink, means that a bigger party just sips the voters from the smaller parties. I see, got it. In its block. It's called in Israel to drink. And you drink after you scream Gevald, okay? So you're drinking, you're screaming Gevald, and then you drink the smaller parties. That's how it used to work. I think it's going to be less effective than usual.
I think that the main source of passable votes for Netanyahu is not voters who plan on voting for Eisencote or Bennett or Ben-Gavir or Smoltrich, but Likud voters who are disillusioned don't see a difference dramatic enough in order to make them go and vote again for the figures that they don't like to say the least from within Likud. And Netanyahu tries to solve the problem by two means. One mean is to change the Likud list.
He won decisively in a vote, in a crucial vote in the Likud Central Committee two days ago that allows him to personally select or nominate eight different candidates for the Likud list. He wants a better Likud, an improved Likud, a Likud with Botox or a plastic surgery, because eight out of thirty is quite a lot. And the second way is the old good way of trying to say if you do not come to vote, so the left and the Arabs are going to take the country from you. And that's Netanyahu's main campaign. It hasn't worked so far in increasing the electoral power of Likud, but it shows signs of success in deterring right-wing voters from electing Eisencourt. So it's too early to call, but it looks as if something is happening there.