Central Elections Committee Orders Shas to Remove Election Video Featuring IDF Soldier

The chairman of the Central Elections Committee, Judge Noam Solberg, has instructed the Shas party and its leader Aryeh Deri to remove an election campaign video published the previous evening. The video showed a soldier returning home for a Sabbath blessing and thanking his brother, a Torah scholar, with the phrase "Thank you for learning Torah." It also claimed that over 30,000 soldiers and career military personnel voted for Shas in the last elections. The party Yashar! filed a complaint, arguing that the video violated prohibitions against using the Israel Defense Forces in election propaganda and against using party list letters before the 42nd day prior to elections. Judge Solberg ruled that the chances of the petition succeeding regarding these two prohibitions justified issuing the requested interim order to remove the video.