Peloni: It is concerning that the Left has consolidated its strength like the Right did in 2022 and yet the Right if actually fracturing its strength even more so than the Left did in 2022. The most recent poll by Filber shows that the increasingly fractured Right Bloc will lose 6 MKs!! The devastating effecct of proliferation of new small parties who will likely not pass the threshold to enter the Knesset, and thereby waste the votes they receive, will not be something the Right will overcome.
Yossi Baum | X | Aug 13, 2026
Concerning: The Left’s “Crumbs” Strategy, and Its Realistic Possibility of Winning (For the Well-Versed)
Long but worthwhile: In order to correctly understand the political game we have been in recent years, with an emphasis on the current elections, one must understand where the Left is heading, knowing that it has completely lost the majority in the State of Israel.
For this reason, the Left has completely changed strategy, to one that stands on 3 legs:
A. — Fragmentation. That is, biting off every possible crumb from the Right. In every possible way.
B. — Preparing the ground for the partnership of Arab parties in the coalition.
C. — Separating the Haredim from the right-wing bloc.
And in greater detail:
A. The “crumbs” wing of the strategy includes:
- The Central Elections Committee
- Inciting groups and sections of the Right
- Small right-wing or fake-right-wing parties
- Flying Left-wing voters in from abroad
1. The Central Elections Committee — Let us take as an example the prohibition on reporting to parties about those who voted. Do not take this lightly; this decision alone may cost the Right 2–3 mandates. And this is not the only decision Solberg is issuing against the Right.
2. Inciting groups and sections of the Right — Take, for example, the Haredi party that is trying to run Moti Leitner, who may be a worthy person in his own right—but gives the impression that he is being assisted by Left-wing elements. Anyone who understands the numbers knows that there is no chance in the world for such a list to cross the threshold. Why, then, is it worthwhile for the Left to invest in such a party? Because it creates agitation and antagonism between groups or individuals within the Haredi public who would like their voice to be expressed at a higher level. In every camp there will be people like this, and strengthening their sense of disappointment can lead to not voting, which again—takes additional crumbs from the right-wing camp.
We can also expect later to see general incitement within the Haredi camp against the MKs who “failed to pass a conscription law,” in a style similar to the work that Ayelet HaShachar Seidof admitted to doing. The goal, again: to strengthen the sense of disappointment that may keep potential Right voters at home.
3. Small parties — From Erdan and Edelstein, through Hendel, Feiglin, Winter, and Noam. The Left does not give up on any vote it can take away from the Right. Therefore, in the coming period we will see an excess of screen time—relatively speaking—for each of the aforementioned lists. Anything that can lose votes from the Right-wing camp.
This includes an emphasis on parties for reservists—whose role is to bring to the surface the feelings of disappointment among reservists and their families, not only so that they will vote for parties that “will take care of enlistment,” but no less than that—to cause the disappointed to stay home on election day.
4. Flying Left-wing voters in from abroad This is an initiative that can be dismissed when isolated on its own. After all, even 30 airplanes are not even one mandate. But when one understands the “crumbs” strategy, whose goal is to bring the Left to the point where it has one more mandate than the Right (without the Haredim), and when one understands how much this goal is within the Left’s reach (see below), one understands that if the Left succeeds in bringing 15,000–20,000 votes in this way, it could have an enormous impact.
Overall, in my estimation, the “crumbs” strategy is expected to cost the Right on the order of 3–7 mandates (in previous elections it already cost 2–4 mandates; this time it could rise. Unless Netanyahu wages an all-out war against these attempts, as he did in the last elections with fairly great success).
B. Preparing the Arab parties for legitimacy. The Left learned a lesson from the election rounds at the beginning of the decade, as well as from the fall of the Bennett–Lapid government, and understood that they must solve the “problem” of Israeli reluctance to include Arab parties in a coalition, in one way or another.
The move of transferring Segalovitz to Ra’am is brilliant from this perspective. It has a psychological effect that cannot be dismissed. I am curious to see in what way Netanyahu will try to neutralize this effect. The “whitewashing” of Ra’am has a critical effect, as we will see below.
C. Separating the Haredim from the right-wing bloc This is perhaps the most concerning part in my view, and I hope Netanyahu is duly aware of it.
One must understand that in Haredi eyes, the arrests of Torah learners (those who truly are such) are a formative event on a historical scale, no less. And it can be a genuine trigger (in Haredi public opinion) for sitting on the fence. The Haredim will indeed not officially go with the Left, but they are certainly capable of “sitting on the fence” and receiving political benefits in exchange for specific votes. And unfortunately, there are quite a few Haredi activists who have an interest in this type of conduct.
One must understand that if such a move succeeds, the Left does not need 61, and not even close to it. Assuming that the Haredi parties receive around 18 mandates, if they “sit on the fence,” abstain in the vote for prime minister, and vote differentially—the meaning is that the game for forming a government is among only about 102 mandates, meaning; 52 mandates are enough to win the premiership.
According to Filber’s latest poll, the Left with Ra’am has 53 mandates**. And here lies the big problem. And this is also the reason the Left is fighting for every fraction of a percentage point. A scenario in which the Left receives one more mandate than the Right without the Haredim is completely realistic at the moment. And since the Supreme Court is the only one—at present—that can grant the Haredim an exemption from enlistment, they will find it very difficult to resist this temptation (I would not suggest counting on Deri in this context. The rabbis and heads of yeshivas will fold him within a few minutes).
(Netanyahu’s plan, incidentally, beyond a standard campaign—is to land a crushing blow on Iran in the coming weeks. Let’s hope he succeeds.)***
In conclusion: When one understands that this strategy stands at the center of the Left’s strategy, one understands that Feiglin and co. are not merely “not okay,” they are an existential threat to the Right and to Israel’s security. Their running all the way to the end is the very heart of the Left’s strategy—the “crumbs” strategy. And this is why the Right must, above all, cut off all these attempts. Before it is too late.
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