Meretz and Hatnua Hahadasha unveil their joint Knesset list

Channel 10 journalist Nitzan Horowitz, attorney Talia Sasson, former Labor MK Tzali Reshef to fill 3rd, 7th and 9th slots respectively.

By SHELLY PAZ
nitzan horovitz 88 (photo credit: )
nitzan horovitz 88
(photo credit: )
Hatnua Hahadasha (The New Move) announced on Thursday which of its members will run for Knesset as part of a joint list with Meretz. Hatnua Hahadasha will have the third, seventh, ninth and 12th slots on the list, which will be filled by television journalist Nitzan Horowitz, attorney Talia Sasson, former Labor MK Tzali Reshef and Arab filmmaker Ibtisam Mara'ana, respectively. Horowitz heads Channel 10's foreign desk, while Sasson wrote a controversial report on illegal West Bank outposts for then-prime minister Ariel Sharon in 2005. Reshef, a Hatnua Hahadasha founder, led its negotiating team. Meretz Chairman Haim Oron expressed hope at a press conference in Tel Aviv on Thursday that Hatnua Hahadasha would help bring the joint list success in February's general elections. "I hope we will go hand-in-hand in a journey against a rising right-wing block that is getting stronger and stronger," Oron said. "We feel the immediate need to offer an alternative." Horowitz, who has been promoting environmental issues in recent years, said at the press conference that it had not been easy to decide on the move from reporting to politics. "My goal is to continue to do what I have been talking about over the past years, from protecting the seashore to promoting more sophisticated, nonpolluting public transportation," he said. "I know that in going into politics, it means also becoming a politician. I go there not because I am looking for a job, but as someone who has an agenda and ideology. I hope other people for whom the green agenda is important will join us," Horowitz told Channel 2. The agreement with Hatnua Hahadasha has pushed most Meretz candidates down the list. For example, MK Zehava Gal-On, who won the third slot in Meretz's primary on Sunday, was relegated to the fourth slot on the joint list. Not all Meretz candidates were happy with the conditions of the merger. Former Meretz MK Mossi Raz, who now has the fifth slot on the joint list, said that pushing the party's Arab candidate from the seventh to the 10th spot was wrong, as was pushing back candidates in slots reserved for women and other sectors. That Arab candidate, accountant Issawi Frige, criticized the move as well, saying an Arab had not represented Meretz in the Knesset since Hosniya Jabarra in 1999-2003. The final version of the joint list is due to be approved on Monday in Tel Aviv by the Meretz Council, which will also approve the joint party's official name.