Deri breaks silence: "We survived insane incitement campaign"

Watch Deri's address to the party meeting

Shas chairman Aryeh Deri broke a long silence Thursday, speaking publicly for the first time since the election results showed the party dropping to six Knesset seats.

Deri addressed a special party meeting at Shas headquarters in Jerusalem, attended by Knesset members and party representatives from across the country. He spoke about what he described as a difficult election campaign marked by pressure and incitement against the movement.

The gathering opened with an emotional recitation of "Mizmor L'Todah" by all members of the faction and representatives, expressing gratitude for internal unity and for the public's support of the Council of Torah Sages.

'Mizmor L'Todah' at the opening of the party meeting

"We must thank Hashem for the bad and for the good, even when we do not understand His calculations," Deri began. "Baruch Hashem, 300,000 people said yes to the call of the Council of Torah Sages and were not tempted by the insane incitement campaign against us over the past three years, from within and from without."

Deri described the intensity of the campaign the movement faced in recent years and called the election results an "outright miracle": "I have been in these campaigns for decades; there has never been anything like this. During wartime they exploited the quiet and responsibility we showed in order to attack the movement and its leaders. They even tried to split our spiritual leadership. Experts told me they did not believe it was possible to survive such a campaign. This is truly a miracle, and for that we must thank Hashem."

The Shas chairman emphasized the achievement of maintaining party ranks and unity, which he said is not taken for granted in the turbulent political landscape: "Not only did we survive, but we preserved something that almost no other party has: one spiritual leadership, one political leadership, one Knesset faction, and all representatives in local authorities united. This is not self-evident. For all of this we said Mizmor L'Todah."