Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu issued a public appeal on Monday to voters not to support smaller right-wing parties that may not pass the 3.25 percent electoral threshold in the October 27 election, warning that it could destroy the current coalition’s chances of retaining power and lead to the election of a “fascist regime.”

“This election will be decided by every vote. Don’t waste your vote on small parties that may not pass the threshold and bring the left to power. Don’t waste votes. Keep the right. Vote for Likud,” the premier declared in a Hebrew social media post.

The video was published on Netanyahu’s Instagram account a day before hawkish ex-IDF general Ofer Winter is slated to launch a new party which polls suggest could draw a significant number of votes from the far-right, weakening the parties that currently make up the governing coalition.

The prime minister is lagging in the polls ahead of the October 27 elections, but the Zionist opposition is generally polling just short of a 61-seat majority in the 120-member Knesset.

Netanyahu argued in the video that the 1992 general election was proof that voting for smaller right-wing parties was a mistake, as the bloc led by Labor leader Yitzhak Rabin won a decisive victory, ushering in the Oslo Peace Accords, because breakaway right-wing parties established by those angry with then-Likud prime minister Yitzhak Shamir failed to pass the electoral threshold.

“We paid with thousands upon thousands of murdered citizens and thousands of casualties, and we are still dealing with this problem today, all stemming from that mistake, where splinter right-wing parties fell out and brought down the right-wing government,” Netanyahu said, appearing to........

© The Times of Israel