Jerusalem dati leumi councilman Aryeh King, who has a long record of fighting to preserve and liberate Jewish Jerusalem and to safeguard Shabbos, is calling on his dati leumi followers to back the chareidi candidate for Jerusalem mayor should the chareidi parties back a united chareidi candidate in the race.

King made his comments following the failed vote on the Mitcham HaTachana, as Moshe Leon did not vote with the chareidim and therefore, the vote went in favor of permitting the Mitcham HaTachana to operate on Shabbos.

In the last elections, King led the Yerushalayim party to success, with two seats in the coalition. Together with the Bayit Yehudi party, they received 19,000 votes.

Since the last elections, things have changed. Dov Kalmanovich moved from Bayit Yehudi to King of Yerushalayim Meuchedet. Chagit Moshe however moved from Yerushalayim Meuchedet to Bayit Yehudi. King also reached agreement with Eli Yishai, to back his list, and one of the high slots on the list will go to Yonatan Yosef, a grandson of Maran HaGaon HaRav Ovadia Yosef ZT”L who was extremely active in the Shimon HaTzaddik (Sheikh Jarrah) neighborhood of the capital.

According to the Jerusalem Institute for Policy Studies, the chareidim constitute about 40 percent of the city’s Jewish residents, while the rest are dati leumi, chareidi leumi, traditional and secular. In addition, about 38% of the residents are Arabs, but they do not participate in the elections.

(YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)