While everyone was busy speculating on the clash between Degel candidate Shmuel Greenberg and the incumbent Mayor Dr Aliza Bloch trying to guess who is garnering support from where and who has the edge in the upcoming elections, Shas threw down the gauntlet with Deri announcing that they are going to run their own candidate, former Mayor of Bet Shemesh and current MK and Deputy Mayor Moshe Abutbol.

Shas is upset at Degel. The way the Haredi parties conduct elections (in cities controlled largely by them) is by dividing up the spoils with multi-city agreements, such as, in Bnei Braq you will support my candidate for mayor and in exchange in Elad I will support yours, while in Rechasim you will support mine and in Bet Shemesh I will support yours, etc. Degel seems to have broken the long standing set of agreements, and Shas is upset. In Bet Shemesh there is an additional problem in that Shas considers Shmuel Greenberg persona non grata as they say he hurt them in the past (both in Bet Shemesh and Jerusalem) keeping Sefardic girls out of Ashkenazi seminaries, etc. 

Running Moshe Abutbol for mayor in Bet Shemesh could be a real run at the mayorship, or it could be just to hurt Greenberg without explicitly helping Bloch who they also have lesser problems with. Being that Abutbol has not yet resigned from the Knesset or from his position as Deputy Minister, I personally consider it a not real candidacy, though it has potential to become one.

the announcement threw everyone in a tizzy. What does it mean? Who does it help? Who does it hurt? Each of the different commentators came up with a different explanation of how and why, and also of what it means for the elections as to who has a better chance of winning. Though it does look to almost guarantee that no candidate will win outright in the first round and we will almost definitely go to a second round to declare a winner. Imagining the scenarios that could play out and trying to guess who will support whom when and if what is dizzying

It looks like Shas is going to do the same in a few other cities as well now. And it also looks like Degel is going to retaliate and run their own candidate in Jerusalem against Lion instead of supporting him, and possibly oppose Shas in other cities as well.

And rumors are swirling over other candidates that might still announce, making it even more complicated and unpredictable!

We wait to see what happens, but it looks like this will likely be one of the most interesting municipal elections ever...