Internal polls involving thousands of respondents place Saar's party at 7-6 seats • This is a dangerous slope, and whoever falls into it may end the election at home This week "
storm
Photo:
Yossi Zeliger
The feelings at the New Hope headquarters were difficult.
Like feelings of old hope vanished.
They have already seen the decline to a single-digit figure in surveys.
Saw it coming, but could do nothing to stop it.
The slope they entered is a slippery slope.
A candidate for prime minister who gets 9 seats or less, loses confidence and is abandoned.
In polls in other parties, which are usually conducted on the basis of thousands of respondents and not hundreds, Saar has already dropped to the region of 7-6 seats.
It is no longer a battle for prime minister, but for the blocking percentage.
Assault, like Assault, prefers to place all the blame on others.
There is no one at the party's election headquarters who came out this week without a reprimand, remark or reprimand from the boss, who acted in a daze as if everything around him was in complete collapse.
The campaign is faltering, anger, unfocused media messages, scolding.
Every day, the media snatches beatings and does not behave properly.
The employment of Zilberstein and Abigail added tension
The publication in "Israel Today" about the employment of Tal Zilberstein and Maor Avigal at the election headquarters - two convicted of crimes, one abroad, the other in Israel, who to this day have taken care with a new hope to deny or evade their desire to employ - added great tension From the direction of Zilberstein himself who was furious at things.
Saar positioned himself in a distinctly non-Bibi camp.
Whoever wants to see Netanyahu remains the prime minister, he said at the beginning, that he will not vote for me.
But this camp already has a leader.
Yair Lapid is his name.
Saar's attempt to present himself as an alternative to Netanyahu on the right failed, while the Likud's message that Saar could not form a right-wing government under any circumstances, permeated.
Saar on tour in Eilat // Photo: Ran Shauli
Lesser in base.
Unlike the Likud parties, There is a Future, Meretz and Labor, its supporters do not feel obligated to support it.
Meretz can launch a forced campaign.
Its former voters, who thought they were grazing in foreign fields, would run back to it so that God forbid it would be erased.
The storm has no such possibility.
And if it is no longer perceived as an alternative, one can find a bad future home, or with Naftali Bennett, which remains stable at the moment.
But Saar's hopes had not yet been lost.
The one who can come to his aid is none other than Meir Lapid.
The two are coordinated and know that only in combined action can they succeed.
Lapid has already tried to help the storm when he announced that if he got bigger he would not mind sitting under him, a message that was even intensified by him recently, when Netanyahu started with the "Lapid or Netanyahu" campaign.
Now, to help Saar - who brings him audiences he, Lapid, cannot bring himself - stop the bleeding and prevent a new collapse of hope, Lapid will have to sharpen the message even further and help Saar present himself as a candidate who, despite the fall, is still relevant.
The full column - on Friday in "Israel This Week"