The Degel Hatorah and Agudat Yisrael factions of UTJ yesterday signed an agreement to merge and run on one ticket in the upcoming elections. This is seemingly the first step in the united Haredi party they have been talking about. The next step would be to bring in Shas and if possible the other smaller Haredi parties (e.g. Yachad, Etz, etc)...

In general this is a good thing. These parties should be running together as there is almost no difference between them and a united front is better for the community. Shas will be more difficult and is not to be taken for granted, as they have been attractive to non-Haredi voters in the past, and as part of a joint haredi party they might lose those votes, so that is a bigger issue to figure out.

Regarding the merger that happened between Degel and Agudah, as good as it is, I do not see how this is any different than what the situation has been until now. They have been running together for a long time already. Practically this is a new agreement and the division is 50-50 between the two factions rather than the 60-40 (I think) in favor of Agudah that was in place by old agreements until now. And the new agreements assures they will continue running together for the foreseeable future rather than split up as has been a consideration recently.

The thing is, as far as unity, nothing has really changed. This is simply a bloc of two parties agreeing to work together to try to maximize voting potential. This is not unity. The two parties are still separate and the UTJ party is comprised of a working agreement as to which faction gets which seats and which factions gets which positions in government - they are still just two separate factions working together. As meaningless, to me, as the word achdut always is, this agreement is just that - no achdut, just voting tactics.

If they actually wanted something more like unity and recognized the shared destiny between them rather than identity politics, they would do a full merge and stop with the factions. All gedolim would sit down together and decide which people are most qualified to represent the Haredi public, or they could hold a primary among all the Haredi communities. They would not need to divide the seats and roles along the lines of Litvishe and Hassidic and that a Gerrer has to get this and a Vishnitzer that and a Belzer something else.

So, as good as this is, for a first step, and it is good as a first step, it is not the ultimate unified party they are using as a slogan - this is really just a slightly improved version of what has been until now.