It is hard to overstate the political drama that consumed Yair Lapid this past weekend. Thirteen years after founding Yesh Atid — the centrist powerhouse that briefly propelled him to the premiership in 2022 — the opposition leader sat down with a sheet of paper and dismantled his life’s work with his own hands.
One by one, Lapid crossed out the names of sitting lawmakers. In a single stroke, he destroyed their political careers, severed their primary livelihoods, and obliterated the futures they had envisioned for themselves in the next Knesset.
A tally of the casualties reveals nearly 20 MKs who embarked on the just-completed grueling Knesset term at Lapid’s side, only to be purged from the slate and vanished as if they had never existed.
These were not backbench fillers; many were excellent parliamentarians who could easily have sustained the faction had it still been polling anywhere near the commanding 24 seats it secured in the November 2022 election.
The list of prominent names left on the cutting room floor includes Karine Elharrar, Mickey Levy, Michal Shir, Moshe Turpaz, Shelly Tal Meron, and Yorai Lahav-Hertzanu.
