“Blue & White”: A Peculiar Political Party (Opinion piece making important predictions -written immediately after the Gantz-Lapid merger to form “Blue & White”) On Feb. 21, 2019, Israel awoke to breaking political news—Benny Gantz’s Israeli Resilience and Yair Lapid’s Yesh Atid parties will run as a united faction, under the name of “Blue & White”. Likewise, it was announced that a third former IDF Chief of Staff, Gabi Askenazi, will join Moshe (Bogey) Yaalon and Gantz himself, in the ranks of the newly formed political alliance. The composition of the Gantz-Lapid union reveals it to be a highly anomalous political entity. For rather than being a body that coalesced around some ideo-intellectual credo or some consensus—however remote—on some socio-political or strategic agenda, it would appear that the centripetal forces that brought Blue & White’s disparate components together, comprised little more than an anti-Netanyahu sentiment. Thus, within the same political framework, we find a Labor Union leader alongside a champion of free-market competition; hardline hawks as well as left-leaning doves. Accordingly, it is not easy to envisage great cohesion and sense of purpose in the party ranks regarding multiple issues that are bound to arise after the elections--whether in the security, diplomatic or socio-economic spheres—and whether the Blue & Whites find themselves in government or opposition. Source: Arutz Sheva- Israel National News ?? IF YOU LOVE ISRAEL - SHARE NEWSRAEL! ??