Kadima leader Shaul Mofaz gathered the eight remaining Kadima MKs who are
running alongside him in the next election at his home in Kochav Yair Monday
night to light Hanukka candles and express hope that there would somehow be
enough votes for all of them in next month’s election.
Current polls
predict three seats at best for the party that won 28 in the last election. Some
polls predict that Kadima will become the first party to go from being the
largest faction in the Knesset to not winning a single seat.
But there
was no talk of miracles at the Mofaz residence at the event that was attended –
with names in the order they appear on the party’s election list – by MKs Mofaz,
Yisrael Hasson, Yohanan Plesner, Ronit Tirosh, Shai Hermesh, Yuval Zellner,
Doron Avital, Akram Hasson and Ahmed Dabah, and their spouses.
Mofaz
promised to win seats in the next Knesset the hard way.
“I am very
optimistic,” Mofaz said. “We have a struggle ahead but we have a very good team
of fighters.
Experienced, quality people, doers who remained loyal to
their path and their voters. The Kadima brigade is ready to fight for Israel’s
character and its future.”
The MKs dined on potato pancakes made by
Mofaz’s wife Orit and played with their party leader’s
grandchildren.
Attendees said Kadima leader Tzipi Livni’s name was not
spoken, and the only enemies mentioned were Syrian Greeks and
darkness.
“Believe me, as a man who has seen a battlefield or two in my
life, I am proud to march shoulder to shoulder with such excellent people,”
Mofaz said.
Kadima signed a vote-sharing agreement Monday with MK Haim
Amsalem’s Am Shalem party. The deal could help ensure that votes beyond what is
needed for a Knesset mandate do not go to waste, but the agreement will only
have an impact if both parties pass the two percent electoral
threshold.
A Kadima official admitted that Kadima and Am Shalem had
little in common.
But he said that after Labor made a deal with Yesh
Atid, The Tzipi Livni Party with Meretz, and Likud Beytenu with Habayit
Hayehudi, there were not too many options available.
“Sometimes, you have
to make do with what you have,” the official said, referring to Am Shalem but
indirectly also to his own party.
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