A joint JoeSettler-Jameel post. 

Left behind in the wake of Netanyahu’s surprise unity maneuver are some serious winners and loser. There is no doubt that elections would have shaken things up, but this unity coalition shakes up things even more.

What Netanyahu managed to do today is of historic proportions and has some serious ramifications for many people on both a personal and national level. We present to you our list of winners and losers.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu: Winner. Bibi would probably have done well in elections, but now he runs the largest unity government ever in the history of Israel, giving him a support base not even Ben-Gurion could have dreamed of.  

Shaul Mofaz: Winner. Mofaz made a fool out of himself when he jumped ship to Kadima, but after sitting it out on the back benches behind Tzipi Livni on the back benched, he’s manages to come out on top and resuscitate the essentially dead Kadima party.

Kadima Party: Winner Until yesterday they were completely irrelevant and simply dead in the water; the largest individual party in the Knesset was forced to face the fact that they might as well not even have been voted into office. Now they have a seat at the table, and perhaps some influence too.

Tzipi Livni: Loser She could have been in the government 3 years ago, 2 years ago, and even 1 year ago. This could have been her and not Mofaz. At the end of the day, Kadima was kept in failure and disgrace because of her. Now it’s obvious to all.

Likud Party: Winner The Likud as a party is more powerful than ever.

Likud MKs: Losers For the most part, their individual influence and power has been diluted. Perhaps significantly.

Labor: Losers They were positioned to be the second largest party. Who knows what will be in a year and a half. They may be in for an even bigger shock in the opposition (see Ahmed Tibi below).  

Shelly Yachimovitch: Black eye Labor lost, but Shelly only got a black eye out of this. Perhaps she’ll lead the Tel Aviv summer block party, if it happens.  

Yisrael Beiteinu: Winner/Loser Yisrael Beiteinu didn’t really want elections, so this is good for them. The downside, their influence has been diluted, perhaps almost completely. One of the goals of this unity coalition is to implement a good replacement for the Tal law. It may happen. Yisrael Beiteinu may even get part of the credit for it, so they can at least bask in the reflected glory.  

Avigdor Lieberman: Loser Lieberman will keep his job, avoid elections, and get the opportunity to try to pass more laws he wants. But on the downside, the investigation(s) against him will now continue, and his influence has been severely diminished. We’ll see if he can make a comeback out of this.  

Ahmed Tibi: Winner What does Ahmed Tibi have to do with this? It’s simple math. Depending on a few factors, there will be only around 26 MKs in the opposition. The Arab have the largest number of opposition members compared to Labor, Meretz (and maybe Ichud Leumi). Ahmed Tibi is poised to be the new head of the opposition.  

Meretz: Losers Outside, irrelevant, no following, and not going to be opposition leader. Not even the Tel Aviv summer block party will be able to help them.  

Aryeh Deri: Loser No explanation needed.

Shas: Winners See Aryeh Deri above.  

Yair Lapid: Loser No explanation needed, but we’ll give one anyway. Sure he can go back to TV and perhaps try again next year, but he really lost his opportunity, even as his followers lost their enthusiasm for him the longer he stayed in the race.

President Obama: Loser Obama is a partisan president, while Bibi is the leader of the largest national unity coalition in the history of Israel. Netanyahu has the support of most of the country behind him for whatever he may need to do. Obama may have hoped he’d be facing a weaker Bibi after November, there’s no chance of that now.  

Dagan, Diskin, etc.: Losers Netanyahu and Barak are messianists, and irrational? Well, then add Mofaz too, and 80% of the Knesset. Now the former security chiefs sound like sore losers.  

Ehud Barak: Winner He still has a job.

Yuval Zellner: Winner Yuval Who? We asked the same thing. Zellner just replaced Livni in the Knesset. Until this morning, he was going to go down in history as one of the shortest serving MKs (who would never get a second chance at it either). Now he gets a chance to serve.  

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu inveighed against the comments made by Jerusalem Mufti Sheikh Muhammad Hussein that glorified the killing of Jews.

“These are heinous words that the world needs to condemn,” Netanyahu said at a cabinet meeting. He called on Attorney-General Yehuda Weinstein to investigate the PA religious leader for incitement after quoting an Islamic text attributed to Muhammad that calls for the killing of Jews.

In response, Hussein denied inciting the killing of Jews, saying he was merely quoting the Islamic text. “I can’t change the Hadith,” he retorted.

Energy minister and Yisrael Beiteinu MK Uzi Landau, reminded the cabinet that “this is not coming from Hamas, which we are used to – this is coming from Palestinian Authority television.”

Last week, the head of the Israeli Civil Administration in Judea and Samaria, Brig. Gen. Moti Almoz convened a meeting with an array of IDF technical experts to discuss the problem of electronically-amplified muezzin calls from mosques.

The five-times-daily muezzin call frequently precipitates complaints of noise pollution, as residents of nearby Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria can easily hear them, especially at night during regular sleep hours.

One proposed solution was the installation of a system in every mosque that would automatically lower the volume if it exceeded a preset decibel level. Almoz ordered his staff to investigate the systems’ feasibility.

Last month, Yisrael Beiteinu MK Anastassia Michaeli proposed a bill to ban the use of electronically-amplified muezzin calls entirely, asserting that “hundreds of thousands of Israelis” were suffering from the Muslim calls to prayer. Initially supported by Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, the bill was shelved due to objections from within his own party.

The leaders of two of Israel’s largest political parties are fighting for their political lives, with one contending with challengers from within and the other facing a criminal indictment.

Kadima leader and opposition chairwoman Tzippi Livni announced that her party would hold primary elections two months from now, responding to pressure from party members dissatisfied with Kadima’s slipping position in recent opinion polls.

Two years ago, Livni led Kadima in general elections that gave the party the highest number of Knesset seats, but her inability to build a coalition allowed Likud to lead the government under Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu. Since then, Livni and Kadima have gradually faded; in recent weeks, various polls have even forecasted a major decline for Kadima, with many of its voters preferring the party that new political entrant Yair Lapid intends to create.

In her announcement on Wednesday, Livni said that only she could lead Kadima to victory over Netanyahu and the Likud in the next general elections. She will face stiff competition, however, from former defense minister Shaul Mofaz, who narrowly lost a bid for the Kadima leadership last time. Mofaz welcomed the announcement of party primaries in March, declaring Livni’s tenure at the top of the party over.

Meanwhile, Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, head of the Knesset’s third-largest party, Yisrael Beiteinu, faced a possible indictment on charges of fraud, breach of trust, money laundering and witness tampering. Attorney-General Yehuda Weinstein is overseeing hearings with prosecutors and defense lawyers as he weighs whether to indict Lieberman.

The accusations relate to alleged offenses dating from 2001 to 2008. Prosecutors say Lieberman set up straw companies to launder millions of shekels that he did not report to tax authorities.

Following the pre-indictment hearings, Weinstein could take several months to reach a decision. The decision would likely have significant political consequences, as Lieberman has said that he would step down as Foreign Minister and leave the Knesset if he is charged.

A new poll has the Likud party winning 33 Knesset seats if elections were held today, while Kadima would plummet to 11, and Labor would get 13 seats. Currently, Likud has 27 seats, Kadima has 28, and Labor has 8.

The poll also found that Yisrael Beiteinu would gain a seat to reach 16 seats, and Shas would lose five seats from its current 13. The Arab parties would win 11 seats total.

Yair Lapid’s impact on the political map appears to be fading a bit, according to the poll. While polling at 20 Knesset seats when he announced his entrance into politics, the most recent poll has him down to 13.

The poll was carried out by by Geocartography Knowledge Ltd.

The Knesset’s Ethics Committee has suspended Raam Taal MK Ahmad Tibi from participating in any Knesset sessions for a week, after he recited a poem disparaging Yisrael Beiteinu MK Anastassia Michaeli.

Tibi read the poem after Michaeli threw water at Labor MK Raleb Majadle during a committee session last week.

In the poem, Tibi spoke of Michaeli, “who  grew there in the garbage pile of Yisrael Beiteinu,” and used an Arabic profanity to describe the incident.

Yisrael Beiteinu on Tuesday introduced a bill that would restrict Knesset membership to citizens that have completed IDF or national service.

The proposal was submitted on Tuesday by MK Moshe Matalon, who said that “serving the country is part of the Israeli ethos . . . Knesset members are supposed to be role models.”

If passed, the bill would effectively mean that the Arab and Ultra-Orthodox parties would be dissolved, as neither community serves in the IDF. With Shas and United Torah Judaism serving as influential members of the current governing coalition, it is unlikely the bill will be passed into law.

Immigrant Absorption Minister and Yisrael Beitenu MK Sofa Landver said on Wednesday that Ethiopian immigration representatives in the Knesset should be grateful to Israel.

Landver made the comments during an emergency session held by the Knesset Committee for Immigration, Absorption and Diaspora Affairs to investigate the issue of discrimination against Ethiopians in Kiryat Malachi. She was responding to an Ethiopian representative, Gadi Desta, who told the MKs that “apartheid” was taking place.

The emergency session was convened against the backdrop of a news report that local homeowners’ committees in Kiryat Malachi consistently refuse to sell or rent property to Ethiopians.