2022 Meretz leadership election

In June 2019, incumbent leader of Meretz Tamar Zandberg was defeated by Nitzan Horowitz in a vote held by the party's conference ahead of a legislative election in September.^[3][4] Following his election, Horowitz formed an alliance with the Israel Democratic Party and the Green Party, named the Democratic Union.^[5] The alliance won five seats in the election.^[6] In the 2020 election, Meretz ran in a joint list with the Israeli Labor Party and Gesher, which won seven seats.^[7] In December 2020, Yair Golan, who previously led the Israel Democratic Party, announced that he would join Meretz.^[8] Meretz ran alone in the 2021 election, where it won six seats,^[9] and subsequently participated the thirty-sixth government, the first time Meretz sat in a government since 2001.^[10][11]

Criticism of incumbent party leader Nitzan Horowitz's leadership included a failure to keep the party's Knesset members in line, which was blamed for playing a factor in the breakdown of the governing coalition.^[12] After an early Knesset election was called, polls showed Meretz polling near (and often below) the electoral threshold.^[13] Despite the interest of leadership within Meretz to run on a joint list with the Israeli Labor Party in the coming election, that party's leader, Merav Michaeli, had dismissed the possibility of this.^[12]

On 12 July 2022, Horowitz announced he would not seek re-election as party leader, but would remain in politics.^[14] On 18 July, following speculation regarding a potential candidacy, former leader of Meretz Zehava Galon stated that she would "Announce when there is something to announce", neither confirming nor denying reports that she was considering a run.^[15][16] The next day, Galon announced she would run for the leadership of Meretz.^[17]

On 6 July 2022, Yair Golan announced his candidacy for Meretz leadership, setting up a contested leadership vote.^[12] On 12 July 2022, incumbent leader Horowitz withdrew from seeking reelection as party leader.^[13] While former party leader Zehava Galon had originally dismissed the possibility of a run at the time that Yair Galon entered the race,^[12] calls for her to run continued.^[12] On 19 July, Galon announced her candidacy.^[1]

In running against Galon, who had already once served as party leader, Yair Golan cast himself as presenting the opportunity to lead the party towards the future rather than the past.^[1] As a former leader of the party, Zehava Galon was regarded to be the candidate preferred by most of party bureaucrats, party leaders, and Knesset members belonging to the party. Yair Golan, however, enjoyed strong support among Kibbutzim members of the party, as well as a constituency of Bedouins living in the Negev. Controversially, nearly a thousand Bedouins had been disqualified from the party voter roll ahead of the election.^[19]

Primaries to determine the party list for the 2022 election were held on 23 August 2022 in conjunction with the leadership vote. As party leader, Zehava Galon was positioned first on the list. Yair Golan was voted fifth position on the party list. Outgoing party leader Horowitz was positioned seventh on the party list. The party was regarded as very unlikely to win as many as seven mandates in the election.^[19]