Vinter is Coming: Amcha Israel Is Not Another Unity Party
Israel’s political system has no shortage of new parties promising to bring Israelis together. Ofer Vinter’s newly launched Amcha Israel is different. It may present itself as a broad national movement, but its political DNA is unmistakably hard-right - and that may be precisely what makes it a serious threat to the established parties of Israel’s right.
Vinter launched Amcha Israel on August 25. He described the party as “clearly and unequivocally” part of the right and pledged to work for “as broad a possible” right-wing government. The party’s platform combines security hawkishness with calls for Haredi draft, cooperation with Arab citizens who are loyal to the state, changes to the judicial system, and a crackdown on organized crime.
But the headline issue is Gaza. At the launch, Vinter declared that “the solution in Gaza is one - emigration.” This is not a center-right unity party like the many we’ve seen in recent months (Gilad Erdan’s The Unity, Sharren Haskel’s Israel First, Yoaz Hendel and Chili Tropper’s Zionist Home, or Benny Gantz and Dedi Simchi), but rather an openly and clearly right-wing party, flanking the Likud from the right both ideologically and electorally.
A Right-Wing Party Without October 7’s Political Baggage
The most obvious advantage Vinter has over the Likud is also the simplest: he did not run the country on October 7.
The Likud enters this election after years in power and after the catastrophic security failure that led to 1,200 murdered, 251 kidnapped, and a three-year war that achieved none of its objectives. Whatever one thinks of Vinter’s policies, he can campaign as an “offensive” officer who preferred aggressive policies but was stopped by the generals (especially Gadi Eisenkot, who kept him out of "core" leadership roles in the military) and the politicians (especially Netanyahu, who did not overturn Eisenkot's decisions), and he does not need to defend the decisions made by the political and military leadership in the last decade.
Vinter's message is simple: it is time for new leadership. Amcha Israel is actually built around new political figures: “Hasbara” activist Yoseph Haddad, journalist Netaeli Shem Tov, and Davidi Ben-Zion, the deputy mayor of the Shomron Council who called in 2023 “to wipe out Chawara.”
His message is therefore remarkably straightforward: the old politicians and generals failed us; now it is time for new leadership.
And unlike many previous “new” parties, Amcha Israel is actually built around new political figures. Its list includes figures such as “Hasbara” activist Yoseph Haddad, journalist Netaeli Shem Tov, and Davidi Ben-Zion, the deputy mayor of the Shomron Council who called in 2023 “to wipe out Chawara.” That gives Vinter something many political newcomers lack: a credible claim to renewal without simply recycling politicians who switch from one party to another.
Vinter is no political moderate
There is another side to the Vinter phenomenon that should not be overlooked.
Vinter’s religious worldview has been central to his public identity for more than a decade. During Operation Protective Edge in 2014, as commander of the Givati Brigade, he sent his soldiers a letter invoking religious language and describing their mission as fighting the “Lord’s War” against an enemy that had “cursed the God of Israel.” His language drew public criticism, including from then-Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon.
That history matters because Vinter’s appeal is not simply that of an “offensive” (theoretically a description of someone with a hawkish approach, but it is a term almost exclusively reserved for religious officers) retired general promising to be tougher and more assertive on security. Vinter was kept out of senior military leadership by “the establishment.” For much of Israel’s religious and nationalist right, he represents something deeper: a combination of famously military hawkishness, religious conviction that blurs the lines between state and religion, and the “out-of-the-system” approach the Israeli right loves.
His political message reflects that identity. Amcha Israel explicitly identifies with the right, rejects a Palestinian state, and places “decisive victory” at the center of its doctrine, but is mostly described as a party that will not merge with any existing party.
This is why it is misleading to describe the party simply as another “right” list, let alone another effort at “unity.” It is an attempt to rebuild the Israeli right around a new kind of leader, perhaps at the expense of the existing parties.
Why is Likud so worried?
Perhaps the clearest indication of Vinter’s potential is not what his party says about Likud, but what Likud and its allies are saying about him. Netanyahu has already warned that new parties such as Vinter’s could cause “the bloc” to fall and called on them either to withdraw or unite with existing parties.
Supporters of the current coalition were already portraying Vinter and his allies as somehow belonging to the left. Vinter advocates an extremely hard line on Gaza, recruited an Arab Israeli who is openly against a Palestinian state, and promises a right-wing government, and is being attacked by the coalition as insufficiently right-wing.
There is a reason the Likud ignores unity parties, but attacks Vinter. Vinter, unlike the unity lists, does not threaten to attract voters who switched to Bennett, Lieberman, or Eisenkot. His natural electoral territory is much closer to the Likud and Itamar Ben Gvir’s base, as the attacks on him reveal.
The days before the launch, and exponentially more since, supporters of the current coalition were already portraying Vinter and his allies as somehow belonging to the left or threatening to produce an Arab-backed government.
The irony is obvious: a party whose leader explicitly calls himself part of the right, advocates an extremely hard line on Gaza, recruited an Arab Israeli who is openly against a Palestinian state, and promises a right-wing government is being attacked by the coalition as insufficiently right-wing.
That tells us that the establishment right is not necessarily afraid that Vinter will win the voters they already lost and might regain, but that he will win the voters still loyal to them.
The Real Constituency: The Populist Right
The most important question is not whether Amcha Israel can attract religious Zionists. It clearly can. The more consequential question is whether Vinter can reach beyond the religious-Zionist sector (which currently votes, at least partially, for Smotrich’s Religious Zionism party) and into the broader populist constituency that has powered the Likud and Ben Gvir.
That constituency is not defined exclusively by geography or ideology. It includes voters who feel that Israel’s political establishment does not see them; residents of the geographic and socioeconomic periphery; people who prioritize security and personal safety at all costs, even at the expense of civil rights; openly racist voters who reject any form of being an Arab Israeli other than Haddad's; and voters attracted to politicians who speak bluntly of national pride, strength, and contempt for the establishment.
Vinter has several unusual assets with which to reach them: he is not a career politician. He has a famous (or notorious) military record. He was rejected by the establishment. He is religious but not exclusively sectoral. And his party deliberately includes people from outside the traditional religious-Zionist sector.
Vinter did not become a Major General, but his political strategy is clear, and, like his military doctrine, it is not risk-averse: exploit the weakness of the Likud and the sectarianism of Religious Zionism. It is much more dangerous for Netanyahu than another small unity party.
Amcha Israel is probably the first genuinely new attempt to build Israel’s post-October 7 right without the people who were responsible for the pre-October 7 right. And if that is what Israeli right-wing voters are looking for, Vinter’s greatest asset is the one thing his opponents cannot attack without making the case for him themselves: he is new.
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