Aryeh Deri

Days after Iran's first direct missile and drone attack on Israel in April 2024, when a strike in return was being weighed, Deri argued for restraint.

“knowing to be restrained, to be patient, listen to our partners and not do things just for revenge and show that we did something.”

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Not clear either way

He counselled holding back from a strike at that moment and acting with allies, which neither backs nor rejects pressure on the regime.

In an interview during the ceasefire in the 2026 war with Iran, Deri said Israel had given the Americans a plan aimed at the fall of the regime, and that he thought the ceasefire made its fall from within more likely.

“The goal was to create conditions for the regime's fall, and I think we created those conditions.”

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With liberty

He backed military action against the Islamic Republic and named the fall of its rulers as the aim.

The Shas faction, which Deri chairs, voted for the bill that added about 31 billion shekels to the 2025 state budget for defence costs, and said beforehand that it would do so because the money buys munitions and pays reservists.

“These are truly matters of saving lives, and therefore the Shas faction will vote for the proposal”

In Hebrew: אלו עניינים של פיקוח נפש ממש, ומשכך, סיעת ש״ס תצביע בעד ההצעה

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With liberty

A vote for extra money for the armed forces in wartime is a vote to fund and equip them.

Deri visited the military prison where yeshiva students were held for not obeying call-up orders, met about ten of them and called for the arrests to stop.

“From here we cry out: stop treating Torah students as criminals”

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Against liberty

He opposes enforcing conscription on men the army has called up.

As interior minister, after the Supreme Court temporarily barred the deportation of thousands of people who had entered Israel illegally from Africa, Deri said the deportations would go on.

“We will respond to the Supreme Court with our response to these frivolous appeals, and then the deportation of the infiltrators - which I started - will continue.”

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With liberty

He ran and defended a programme to deport people who entered the country illegally.

As interior minister, Deri signed orders barring Sheikh Raed Salah, head of the outlawed northern branch of the Islamic Movement, his deputy and other activists from leaving the country.

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With liberty

He used his office against the leaders of a banned organisation tied to the Muslim Brotherhood.

Asked before the March 2021 election whether he would sit in a coalition supported by the Islamic party Ra'am, Deri did not rule it out; he said he would rather rely on his own bloc's 61 seats and that Mansour Abbas could give his support later if he wished.

“I cannot say no or yes because I did not get into the thick of things”

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He neither accepted nor refused governing with the support of the party of the southern Islamic Movement.

When the Knesset passed the Basic Law: Torah Study by 63 votes to 52, a law the Haredi parties had demanded from the prime minister before the Knesset dissolved, Deri welcomed it.

“For the first time, the Jewish state recognizes the supreme value of the holy Torah and the status of those who study it.”

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Against liberty

The law writes a religious value and the standing of those who study religion full time into the country's constitutional laws.

When the finance minister scrapped the tax on sugary drinks brought in by the previous government, a step the Haredi parties had demanded, Deri applauded the decision and called the tax a political measure aimed at underprivileged people.

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With liberty

He backed removing a tax on consumer goods.

In a dispute with the finance ministry over who qualifies for state food vouchers, Deri's office said he would keep fighting to restore the earlier rules, under which about 400,000 families received vouchers.

“Rav Deri will not stay silent and will continue the battle until the criteria are restored to full equality.”

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Against liberty

Food vouchers paid from the state budget to hundreds of thousands of households are more state spending.

When former prime minister Naftali Bennett came to Bnei Brak to speak against an attack on female soldiers there, Deri called him an inciter and asked the police to bar him from the city.

“I call on the police commissioner to immediately issue a restraining order barring Naftali Bennett from the streets of Bnei Brak.”

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Against liberty

He asked the state to keep a political rival who had come to speak out of a city's public streets.