“Of course I’m not taking the video back. It was an attempt at humor, and it’s very funny,” Knesset member Yair Lapid told Army Radio on the morning of Aug. 6. The number-two man in the Blue and White Party was sticking to the campaign he has been running ever since the current electoral race began, but his brash, often scathing attacks on the ultra-Orthodox run counter to Blue and White's strategy, especially that of its leader, Knesset member Benny Gantz.

The video takes Lapid’s campaign against the ultra-Orthodox up a notch. In it, he imagines a WhatsApp group run by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during a discussion with his ultra-Orthodox partners. The text depicts them as greedy extortionists, using the prime minister’s political weakness to their advantage. “Want us to sign? Give us a trillion shekels for the yeshivas,” wrote "Deri Hadash," a stand-in character for Shas chairman Aryeh Deri.

The video caused an immediate commotion. The ultra-Orthodox claimed it was anti-Semitic and called on Gantz to disavow it. “Benny Gantz needs to send him flying,” said ultra-Orthodox Knesset member Moshe Gafni.

The leadership of the Blue and White Party did distance itself from Lapid. Knesset member Moshe Ya’alon, who is number three on the party's list, told Army Radio, “He blurted something out, and we will need to clarify what it was among ourselves.” Gantz also distanced himself from the video and Lapid in a tweet in the spirit of Tisha Be’Av, the Jewish day of mourning that begins Aug. 10. “In these days during which we remember that the destruction of the Temple resulted from unjustified hatred, we must adopt a style different from that of Netanyahu and embrace unconditional love.”