Uri Ariel
Uri ArielHadas Parush/Flash 90

The Tekuma/National Union party council on Thursday evening discussed whether or not to run jointly with Jewish Home as it did in the last elections for the upcoming March 17 elections.

At the end of the meeting a vote on the issue was held.

Minister Uri Ariel, who heads the party, MK Zevulun Kalfa and Natan Natanzon supported splitting from Jewish Home, whereas Betzalel Smutrich, MK Orit Struk and party director Ofir Soffer voted to unify with Jewish Home.

Given that the vote ended in a tie, it was decided to bring the issue to the decision of the Tekuma rabbis for a ruling. Sources in the party said there is a dispute between the rabbis, so that it isn't clear yet what their decision will be. The rabbis will meet Thursday night to discuss the issue.

Tekuma and Jewish Home have been largely at odds lately, with Tekuma sources this week explaining that there is a religious divide.

According to them, Jewish Home's controversial decision to actively court the secular and Druze public threatens to remove the Torah core principles from the party. They pointed to the slew of anti-religious legislation in the last Knesset and warned if the Jewish nature of the party is watered down it likely will no longer be interested in properly defending the Jewish nature of the state.

"In the next Knesset maybe a Druze, an Arab, secular Jews will join the party - to whom exactly will religious laws and the anti-religious attempt to change the nature of Israel matter?" posed the sources.

The two parties are also divided over the issue of primaries, with Ariel demanding seats reserved on the list for his party and Bennett demanding all Tekuma members other than Ariel and possibly one other run in primaries. Tekuma argued this issue was overshadowed by the ideological divide - they also noted Bennett apparently is going to supplant Ariel's number two spot with a candidate of his choosing and that Bennett is going to choose every fifth candidate without primaries.

If Tekuma breaks off from Jewish Home, it is expected to join with former Shas chairperson Eli Yishai's new Yachad party (the name of the party has yet to be finalized). Ariel and Yishai have been discussing the possibility of a joint run extensively.

Yachad as a hareidi party is generally opposed to the idea of female MKs, at least in its own party, with some pointing that this may be a problem given that Struk is a Tekuma MK. However, this issue apparently was surmounted given that Struk will run in Tekuma's party, which would function independently on a joint list with Yachad.