Black clouds continue to gather above Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Unlike the lead-up to the April 9 election, when the prime minister pulled out all the stops and managed to unite the ultra-radical Jewish Power (Otzma Yehudit) with the United Right to ensure their entry into the Knesset, similar efforts ahead of the Sept. 17 elections have failed.

Vehement objection by right-wing stalwart Naftali Bennett prevented Jewish Power's Itamar Ben-Gvir and Baruch Marzel, extremist followers of Rabbi Meir Kahane, from joining the United Right alliance at the last minute before the Aug. 1 deadline for submitting candidate lists. That means Jewish Power will run separately, as will the right-wing libertarian Zehut, led by Moshe Feiglin. In other words, at least three parties are running to Netanyahu’s right, and two of the three are highly unlikely to surpass the electoral threshold by garnering the requisite 3.25% of ballots cast to enter the Knesset. This failure of Netanyahu's survival plan, based on obtaining the maximal number of votes for the right-wing camp, spells trouble.

Nonetheless, one must not forget that the same thing happened in the previous elections: Bennett and his political sidekick, Ayelet Shaked, ran independently of the right-wing alliance as members of the New Right and tripped on the electoral threshold, failing to get into the Knesset. Their votes when combined with those of Feiglin, who also did not attract the required number of votes, represented close to 250,000 votes for the right going straight down the drain.