Yashar leader Gadi Eisenkot and B'Yachad chairman Naftali Bennett met at Bennett's home last weekend to discuss merging their parties ahead of the 27 October election, according to a report. Eisenkot was drawn to the idea because a single larger party would remove the option for Bennett or another opposition figure to demand the premiership as the price of a coalition after the vote.
What changed his mind was watching Bennett's other merger already underway. B'Yachad, Bennett's combined list with Yair Lapid's Yesh Atid, has polled well below what the two parties were pulling in separately before they joined, a result that has already triggered resignations inside Yesh Atid, including MK Michal Shir. A merger meant to add strength had instead produced a party smaller than the sum of its parts, which is the opposite of what Eisenkot was hoping to buy into.
Channel 12 reports a final decision will come at the last minute, but that a merger is currently less likely than not. Both Yashar and Likud remain competitive on their own in current polling, with Eisenkot's party running slightly ahead of or level with Netanyahu's, which lowers the incentive for Eisenkot to dilute a brand that is already performing without B'Yachad attached to it.
Separately on the same day, Gideon Sa'ar's Unity withdrew from the race entirely, with Sa'ar citing a lack of public appetite for the unity government concept his party was built around. Two different tests of the same idea, that combining smaller lists produces a bigger vote, ran in the same week: one party quit rather than find out, and the other watched a live result next door and decided not to repeat it.