The Elections Committee voted 17-16 on Thursday to ban right-wing activist Baruch Marzel from running for the Knesset as a candidate of the new Yachad party, headed by Eli Yishai.

Marzel was labeled a racist, but the narrow margin to toss him out of the elections contrasted with the 27-6 vote earlier in the day to ban Arab Knesset Member Hanin Zoabi from seeking re-election.

The United Arab List will appeal to the Supreme Court to overthrow the committee decision against Zoabi, and Marzel also is likely to appeal.

It will be surprising if the court does not overturn the committee decision. Once the committee has the authority to decide who is a terrorist and who is a racist, the Knesset might as well close down.

There have been grounds for jailing Zoabi for her anti-Israeli activities, but no one has had the political courage to do so.

Marzel is an easier target because right-wing extremists usually see the other side of prison before left-wing extremists. Marzel previously has been handed a suspended 12-month jail sentence.

He has reportedly called on the IDF to target left-wing Uri Avnery, who would have fallen off the left side of Planet Earth long ago if it were flat. Peace Now chairman Yariv Oppenheimer last year filed a complaint with police against Marzel for alleged death threats by Marzel’s followers.

Regarding homosexuals, he has said Israel should conduct a “holy war” against them.

Yachad has placed Marzel on the fourth spot in its list of candidates, guaranteeing him a seat in the Knesset if the party passes the minimum number of votes required for party representation.

The party jumped in the polls the past week. After having been on the borderline of entering the Knesset, surveys now indicate Yachad will win five seats, and one new poll released on Thursday rates it with six seats.

After the Election Committee decision, Marzel said, “The left-wing is gagging mouths. It has been proven that my positions are not racist. We are not afraid and will continue to act for the Land and People of Israeli and the Torah.”

He sounds like the national religious version of some Haredi MKs who know they speak for God, and his candidacy in the Yachad party  was blessed by several national religious rabbis pulling the strings behind the scenes.

If the leftists want “anyone but Bibi,” a select group of rabbis want “anyone but Naftali Bennett, who broke the taboo of the old-guard National Religious Party and brought secular nationalists into his new Bayit Yehudi (Jewish Home) party.

The Central Elections Committee Thursday overwhelmingly against Arab Knesset Member Hanin Zoabi’s eligibility for running for election because of her association with terror.

The Joint Arab List, which includes Zoabi’s Balad party, will appeal the decision to the Supreme Court, where Zoabi stands a good chance of a ruling in her favor.

The 27-6 vote in the committee rejected arguments by the attorney-general that banning Zoabi would be an open invitation to the Supreme Court to get involved in the political process.

Weinstein also advised against disqualifying right-wing activist Baruch Marzel, whose candidacy with the Yachad party also has been appealed to the committee, which has not yet decided on his eligibility.

The opposition to Zoabi’s candidacy by the Herzog-Livni-led “Zionist Camp” party cemented her disqualification, which also was backed by delegates from the Bayit Yehudi (Jewish Home), Likud, Yisrael Beiteinu, Shas and Yachad parties.

Meretz and the Joint Arab List voted in favor of Zoabi.

The vote paved the way for similar action against Marzel, who later on the day also was disqualified.

Both Zoabi and Marzel, who is not a MK, have shown a proficiency for grabbing headlines. Zoabi is known for her nasty language against the IDF and right-wing Jews, and she also was onboard the Mavi Marmara boat in the flotilla led by IHH terrorists nearly six years ago to break the Israeli maritime embargo on Hamas terrorists in Gaza.

Marzel has been involved in stunts such as marching with an Israeli flag in the city of Umm el-Fahm, which also serves as the headquarters for the northern branch of the radical Islamic Movement.

Marzel and Yisrael Beiteinu chairman Avigdor Lieberman, along with the new Yachad party, petitioned the Election Committee to bar Zoabi from running.

The committee hearing was nothing less than a shouting match between Zoabi and hecklers, including Marzel, who jeered when she said Marzel and Lieberman “turned my nation into terrorists,” referring to her nation as “Palestinian.”

Yachad party chairman Eli Yishai shouted at Zoabi that she is a terrorist.

A new poll by Israel Channel 1, shows the Likud leaping ahead of the other parties, and Yachad still passing the electoral threshold:

Likud (Netanyahu): 27

Labor/Zionist Union (Herzog / Livni): 23

The Joint (Arab) List: 12

Bayit Yehudi (Bennett): 11

Yesh Atid (Lapid): 11

UTJ (Gafni / Litzman): 8

Kulanu (Kachlon): 7

Yisrael Beyteynu (Liberman): 6

Shas (Deri): 6

Meretz (Gal-On): 5

Yachad (Eli Yishai): 4

LEFT: Labor (23) + Arab List (12) + Yesh Atid (11) + Meretz (5) = 51

RIGHT: Likud (27) + Bayit Yehudi (11) + Kulanu (7) + UTJ (8) + Shas (6) + Yisrael Beytenu (6) + Yachad (4) = 69

Aryeh Deri of Shas said his party would not join a leftwing government, and preferred to join a national unity government led by the right.

Some voices in Yesh Atid are hinting they would not join a Herzog/Livni led government as it is too left, but no official position has been put forward.

Eli Yishai’s Yachad party continues to pass the electoral threshold.

A new poll by Haaretz-Dialog, to be published on Tuesday, has the following results:

Likud (Netanyahu): 25

Labor (Herzog / Livni): 23

Bayit Yehudi (Bennett): 14

The Joint (Arab) List: 12

Yesh Atid (Lapid): 9

Kulanu (Kachlon): 8

UTJ (Gafni / Litzman): 8

Yisrael Beyteynu (Liberman): 6

Shas (Deri): 6

Meretz (Gal-On): 5

Yachad (Yishai): 4 In terms of Right vs. Left coalitions building, we have the following possibility:

LEFT: Labor (23) + Arab List (12) + Yesh Atid (9) + Shas (6) + Meretz (5) = 55

RIGHT: Likud (25) + Bayit Yehudi (14) + Kulanu (8) + UTJ (8) + Yisrael Beytenu (6) + Yachad (4) = 65

UTJ is unlikely to sit in a leftwing coalition, and Yisrael Beyteynu finally said they wouldn’t.

Kulanu is unlikely too, but it can’t be ruled out.

Yesh Atid would consider joining the right if it meant not sitting in the opposition.

Yisrael Beiteinu chairman Avigdor Lieberman has announced he will sit only with a center-right coalition, virtually blowing apart the illusion promoted by the Labor-Livni party and establishment  media that it can for a coalition government

Lieberman, who has become Israel’s most widely-known if not bizarre chameleon, previously has not ruled out sitting with a coalition headed by new Labor party, which merged with the party headed by Tzipi Livni and renamed itself the “Zionist Camp.”

All pre-election polls since the start of the campaign have shown that the party, co-headed by Yitzchak Herzog and Livni, has no chance of forming a coalition without the support of Yisrael Beiteinu, based on the false assumption that Lieberman would sit with the Haredi parties.

The concept is totally ridiculous, but even that hallucination came undone with Lieberman’s announcement Sunday that “Yisrael Beiteinu never will be part of a leftist government.”

Two weeks ago, he rejected sitting with a coalition that included the left-wing Meretz party, but he finally has realized that he is not the only one who understands that many of the Herzog-Livni candidates would be very comfortable in the Mertz party.

If  the Labor-Livni slate of candidates had been a bit more normal and without the inclusion of potential Knesset Members who unabashedly favor a Palestinian Authority country based on all of its demands, perhaps Lieberman would have held his breath.

One of Labor’s top candidates for the Knesset is Stav Shaffir, who wants to get rid of HaTikvah as Israel’s national anthem because it is too Jewish for Arabs to love.

Another star in the Herzog-Livni camp is Merav Michaeli who has stated that no one should serve in the IDF because of the “occupation.”

Labor Party candidate Zuhair Bahloul maintains that his “Palestinian identity is stronger than [his] Israeli one.”

Lieberman’s party is down to four or five seats in polls, still enough for Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu to want to make part of the next government if the Likud takes charge after the elections in March.

That’s it. If you didn’t register your party by now, you’re not running for the upcoming Knesset elections.

26 parties registered to run. It’s estimated that 9 or 10 will get in.

The oddest result of a month of polls is that there has been almost absolutely no change in the numbers.

The weekly Rafi Smith poll published Thursday night reveals that all parties are more or less stagnant and that national religious voters favoring the new Yachad party headed by Eli Yishai may be wasting their votes.

The new party has been on the edge of winning the minimum number of votes to enter the Knesset, but the Smith poll leaves Yachad under the radar. If polls in the next two weeks do not clearly show that the party has enough backing to win Knesset representation, voters are likely to abandon the sinking ship in favor of the Bayit Yehudi (Jewish Home) party.

Labor-Livni, running under the banner of the “Zionist Camp” party, would win 25 seats in the Knesset if elections were held today, according  to the Smith survey. The number is unchanged from last week’s survey.

Similarly, the Likud party, headed by Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, would win 24 seats, followed by Bayit Yehudi with 16, one more than last week.

Next in line are Yesh Atid, whose chairman is Yair Lapid, with nine seats, and Shas, headed by Aryeh Deri with eight Knesset Members. Both parties’ support is unchanged from last week.

Kulanu (All of Us) headed by Moshe Kahlon won enough backing for eight seats, one less than last week.

Yehadut HaTorah (United Torah Judaism), the Ashkenazi Haredi party, gained one seat and now has eight projected MKs. Both Meretz and Yisrael Beiteinu lost one seat and are down to five,

The joint Arab list of parties won 12 seats, one more than in the previous poll.

The changes of one seat up or down are relatively insignificant given the margin of error in surveys.

Pollsters insist there is a large bloc of undecided voters, but if that is the case, they appear to be decidedly undecided.

No matter how you spin the  numbers, the results still show that Labor-Livni, or the Zionist Camp if you prefer the official name, have no chance of forming a government.

One Jewish Press report last week suggested that the Arab parties are “natural partners” for a left-wing coalition and that even if they don’t join the coalition, they would give their support for it in critical votes. Arab parties never have agreed to be part of an Israeli government, and given the fact that several of the Arab MKs are blatantly pro-Palestinian Authority and openly against a Jewish State of Israel, they are not about to change the tradition.

However, it also is unlikely that Kulanu and Yesh Atid would accept demands of the Arab parties if push came to shove and Herzog and Livni were to propose a coalition needing support of Arab MKs.

No party has any momentum. The only likely changes in the strength of the left-wing or right-wing camp will come from lukewarm supporters of Kulanu and Yesh Lapid.

That leaves the undecided voters to make up their minds, and they have a little more than six weeks to do so.