Gadi Eizenkot, a former chief of staff of the Israel Defense Forces, has decided to leave the National Unity Party and immediately resign from parliament, the party stated on Monday night.
Eizenkot had told party chairman Benny Gantz that he would “return his mandate to the party” by resigning from the Knesset, the party said, which will allow him to run with a different party in the next election.
“The two emphasized the years-long friendship and tremendous respect between them, and that they will continue to cooperate for the shared goals and the people of Israel in the future,” the party said.
Sources surrounding Eizenkot were quoted by Hebrew media as saying on Monday that the way the National Unity Party’s primaries are being conducted undermines the democratic reforms he aimed to promote, and that this “would not allow him to realize his ideas and ideology.”
In a separate statement late on Monday night, Gantz claimed that “in recent weeks, significant ideological and conceptual gaps emerged between us, in relation to the correct way to serve the State of Israel.”
“Gadi is, first of all, a personal friend, he is a reasonable person, who served the country for decades, and I am sure he will continue to serve it in his own way,” wrote Gantz, adding that the two would remain friends.
On Tuesday, National Unity Party Knesset member Matan Kahana announced that he was joining Eizenkot in departing from Gantz’s faction and the Knesset.
Kahana, a former Israeli Air Force pilot who served as religious services minister under then-prime minister Naftali Bennet in 2021 and 2011, has reportedly met with Bennett, who is seeking to return to politics.
“When I have something to announce, I will announce it,” Kahana told the Jewish state’s Kan News public broadcaster on Tuesday afternoon.
Meanwhile, sources in the National Unity Party told the Ynet outlet that Eizenkot had also departed the Knesset to find a new political home ahead of the next election—possibly opposition leader Yair Lapid’s Yesh Atid Party.
Ynet said that following the departure of the two, National Unity was pressuring MK Orit Farkash-Hacohen to remain part of the faction.
Eizenkot was candidate No. 3 on the National Unity Party’s list for the November 2022 election, after Gideon Sa’ar, who split from Gantz’s party in March 2024, eventually joined Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government and became Israel’s foreign minister.
Before being elected in 2022, Eizenkot served as the IDF chief of staff between 2015 and 2019 during consecutive Netanyahu governments.
Eizenkot served on Netanyahu’s War Cabinet as an observer alongside Gantz following Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, cross-border terrorist assault on the Jewish state. Gantz withdrew the National Unity Party from the wartime government some eight months into the fighting.
Eizenkot’s 25-year-old son, IDF Master Sgt. (res.) Gal Meir Eizenkot, was killed fighting Hamas terrorists in Gaza in December 2023, followed by the former IDF chief’s nephew, Capt. Yogev Pazi, less than a year later.