Another departure from Yesh Atid: Veteran MK will not run in the elections
Former minister Meir Cohen, one of the party's veterans, announced that he will not run on the "Beichad" list of Bennett and Lapid for the next Knesset. He will be appointed chairman and president of the Yesh Atid conference.
Member of Knesset and former minister Meir Cohen, one of the veteran Knesset members from Yesh Atid, has decided not to run on the "Beichad" list of Naftali Bennett and Yair Lapid for the next Knesset. This was stated in an official announcement from the party. It was reported that "MK Cohen will be appointed chairman and president of the Yesh Atid conference."
Cohen's departure joins a long line of exits in the top ranks of Yesh Atid in recent years. Of the 24 list members who entered the Knesset after the 2022 elections, eight have already left the Knesset, the party, or announced they would not continue to run on its behalf: Orna Barbivai, Meir Cohen, Yoel Razvozov, Elazar Stern, Yoav Segalovitz, Boaz Toporovsky, Idan Roll, and Ron Katz. Yesh Atid won 24 mandates then and was the second largest faction in the Knesset.
Some of the departures occurred as early as the beginning of the term. Former Minister of Tourism Yoel Razvozov announced in January 2023 that he was "taking a break from public life" and resigned from the Knesset, while Orna Barbivai, who was placed second on the list, left a few months later to run for mayor of Tel Aviv-Yafo. Idan Roll left Yesh Atid in January 2025, founded the "Ha-rov ha-leumi" faction, and later also announced his retirement from the Knesset and political life.
The wave of departures intensified ahead of the 2026 elections. Boaz Toporovsky, one of the founders of Yesh Atid, announced in June his retirement from political life, and the following month Ron Katz did the same. In August, Yoav Segalovitz announced his departure from the party and his resignation from the Knesset, against the backdrop of contacts he held to join the Ra'am list. Shortly after him, Elazar Stern also left after 11 years in Yesh Atid, and later joined Gadi Eisenkot's "Yashar!" party.
The departures also come against the backdrop of the change Yesh Atid underwent ahead of the elections, following the union between Lapid and Naftali Bennett and the establishment of the "Beichad" list. Ahead of the closing of the lists, a surplus of candidates for a smaller number of realistic spots was created in the united party: alongside the incumbent Yesh Atid MKs, Bennett added a long line of candidates of his own, while polls give the list fewer mandates than the number of names seeking to join it.
