Likud (Hebrew: הַלִּיכּוּד, romanized: HaLikud, lit.'The Consolidation'), officially known as Likud – National Liberal Movement (Hebrew: הַלִּיכּוּד – תנועה לאומית ליברלית, romanized: HaLikud – Tnu'ah Leumit Liberalit), is a major right-wing political party in Israel.[26][27][28] It was founded in 1973 by Menachem Begin and Ariel Sharon in an alliance with several right-wing parties. Likud's landslide victory in the 1977 elections was a major turning point in the country's political history, marking the first time the left had lost power. In addition, it was the first time in Israel that a right-wing party received the most votes.[29] After ruling the country for most of the 1980s, the party lost the Knesset election in 1992. Likud's candidate Benjamin Netanyahu won the vote for prime minister in 1996 and was given the task of forming a government after the 1996 elections following Yitzak Rabin's assassination. Netanyahu's government fell apart after a vote of no confidence, which led to elections being called in 1999 and Likud losing power to the One Israel coalition led by Ehud Barak.
In 2001 Likud's Ariel Sharon, who replaced Netanyahu following the 1999 election, defeated Barak in an election called by the prime minister following his resignation. After the party recorded a convincing win in the 2003 elections, Likud saw a major split in 2005 when Sharon left to form the Kadima party. This resulted in Likud slumping to fourth place in the 2006 elections and losing 28 seats in the Knesset. Following the 2009 elections, Likud was able to gain 15 seats, and, with Netanyahu back in control of the party, formed a coalition with fellow right-wing parties Yisrael Beiteinu and Shas to take control of the government from Kadima, which earned a plurality, but not a majority. Netanyahu served as prime minister from then until 2021. Likud had been the leading vote-getter in each subsequent election until April 2019, when Likud tied with Blue and White[30] and September 2019, when Blue and White won one more seat than the Likud.[31] Likud won the most seats at the 2020[32] and 2021 elections, but Netanyahu was removed from power in June 2021 by an unprecedented coalition led by Yair Lapid and Naftali Bennett.[33][34] He subsequently returned to the office of prime minister after winning the 2022 election.[35]
A member of the party is called a Likudnik (Hebrew: לִכּוּדְנִיק)[36] and the party's election symbol is מחל (Arabic: محل), reflecting the party's origins as an electoral list of several pre-existing parties, including those who used the symbols מ, ח and ל.[37]
Daniel Tauber (13 August 2010). "Ze'ev Jabotinsky (1880-1940)". Likud Anglos. Archived from the original on 22 February 2011. Jabotinsky's movement and teachings, which can be characterized as national-liberalism, form the foundation of the Likud party.
McGann, James G.; Johnson, Erik C. (2005). Comparative Think Tanks, Politics and Public Policy. Edward Elgar Publishing. p. 241. ISBN978-1-78195-899-5. Archived from the original on 28 January 2024. Retrieved 6 March 2016. The Likud Party, the party of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, is a national-liberal party, while the Labor Party, led by Shimon Peres, is more left-wing and identified as social-democratic.
"Meet the parties – Likud". Haaretz. 2015. Archived from the original on 16 May 2019. Retrieved 1 March 2015. A national-liberal political movement (center-right, in Israeli terms) that was established as an alliance of parties that united into a single party in 1984.
^Watzal, Ludwig (1999). Peace Enemies The Past and Present Conflict Between Israel and Palestine. PASSIA. p. 28.
^"Israel: Cracks in the Facade". Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung. 23 January 2023. Archived from the original on 30 January 2023. Retrieved 7 December 2023. Benjamin Netanyahu's national-conservative party Likud
^Amnon Rapoport (1990). Experimental Studies of Interactive Decisions. Kluwer Academic. p. 413. ISBN978-0-7923-0685-6. Likud is a liberal-conservative party that gains much of its support from the lower and middle classes, and promotes free enterprise, nationalism, and expansionism.
^Joel Greenberg (22 November 1998). "The World: Pursuing Peace; Netanyahu and His Party Turn Away from 'Greater Israel'". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 14 December 2019. Retrieved 30 June 2015. Likud, despite defections, had joined Labor in accepting the inevitability of territorial compromise.... Revolutionary as it may seem, Likud's abandonment of its maximalist vision has in fact been evolving for years.
^Ethan Bronner (20 February 2009). "Netanyahu, Once Hawkish, Now Touts Pragmatism". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 19 May 2019. Retrieved 30 June 2015. Likud as a party has made a major transformation in the last 15 years from being rigidly committed to retaining all the land of Israel to looking pragmatically at how to retain for Israel defensible borders in a very uncertain Middle East....
^"Israel: New Netanyahu government vows to expand settlements". Deutsche Welle. 28 December 2022. Archived from the original on 10 March 2023. Retrieved 19 March 2023. Benjamin Netanyahu's right-wing Likud Party announced its key policy priorities for the new Israeli government on Wednesday, with settlement expansion at the top of the list.
^"Senior member of Netanyahu's party breaks away as Israeli election beckons". Reuters. 9 December 2020. Archived from the original on 29 March 2023. Retrieved 19 March 2023. A prominent rival of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the right-wing Likud party announced on Tuesday a breakaway bid aimed at defeating the Israeli leader in a looming early national election.,
^Baskin, Judith Reesa, ed. (2010). The Cambridge Dictionary of Judaism and Jewish Culture. Cambridge University Press. p. 304. ISBN978-0-521-82597-9. Archived from the original on 28 January 2024. Retrieved 30 June 2015. To overcome Labor Party dominance, the bulk of center-right parties formed Likud.... In the early twenty-first century, Likud remains a major factor in the center-right political bloc.