HaRav Amichai Eliyahu, the grandson of the Rishon L’Tzion HaGaon HaRav Mordechai Eliyahu, z’tl, and the son of the Rav of Tzfas, HaRav Shmuel Eliyahu, announced on Sunday evening that he is joining Itamar Ben-Gvir’s Otzma Yehudit party.

Eliyahu, 43, is the founder of Igud Rabbanei Igud Hakehillos, which has hundreds of member communities. He is a resident of the Rimonim yishuv in Binyamin and the father of six children. He will fill the fourth slot on the Otzma Yehudit slate.

Rav Eliyahu learned in hesder yeshivos and then enlisted in the IDF for combat service in the paratrooper unit and fought in the Second Lebanon War. Upon his release from the IDF, he was appointed as a Rosh Mesivta in the yeshivah high school in Haspin. Later he established a Torani community in Migdal HaEmek and then founded the Igud Rabbani Hakehillos, an organization that unites 350 shul Rabbanim throughout Israel.

In addition, he founded the Shedarim organization, which is focused on the connection between the Jews of Israel and those in the Diaspora, as well as the organization Tzav Echad, which is active in ensuring the religious rights of traditional IDF soldiers. He is also one of the founders of a special Beis Din focused on the protection against sexual abuse by people in authority.

In other election news, Ayelet Shaked and Yoaz Hendel held a press conference on Sunday evening to announce the addition of Amitai Porat as No. 3 on the Zionist Spirit party list.

Porat, who has served in recent years as the head of the religious kibbutz movement, is the son of the late Rabbi Chanan Porat, z’l, one of the founders of the Jewish settlement movement in Yehudah and Shomron.

Shaked and Hendel added Porat to their slate in a bid to attract national religious voters to their slate.

Recent polls continue to show that the Zionist Spirit party will not pass the electoral threshold.

(YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)