Guardians of Jewish tradition: from crisis to rehabilitation in the Shas party, 2019-21 Nissim Leon Department of Sociology and Anthropology, Bar-Ilan University, Israel Gan, Israel ABSTRACT The big drama of Israel’s four closely spaced national elections in 2019–21 was accompanied by another, smaller, drama: the country’s plunge into political chaos gave the Shas party an opportunity for electoral, organisational, and political revitalisation. The four election campaigns transformed Shas from a Mizrahi-Haredi party in decline, barely able to pass the minimum vote thresh- old, into a stable party practicing a tightly focused politics – living proof that Haredi politicians were again occupying positions of power and infuence. Not only did Shas do outstanding organisational and political work; it also demon- strated an impressive ability to align with the Israeli right’s core national- political agenda: the connection between security and tradition. The language of the Shas message evolved from one election campaign to another: what started as a Haredi (ultra-Orthodox) discourse of cultural partnership with a religious-lite or masorti (traditionalist) public turned into a Zionist discourse of national partnership with a ‘right-lite’ voting public (Likud). KEYWORDS 2019-21 Israeli elections; Shas; Likud; Aryeh Deri; ultra-Orthodox politics The big drama of Israel’s four closely spaced national elections in 2019–21 was accompanied by another, smaller, drama: the country’s plunge into political chaos gave the Shas party an opportunity for electoral, organisa- tional, and political revitalisation. The four election campaigns transformed Shas from a Mizrahi-Haredi party in decline, barely able to pass the mini- mum vote threshold, into a stable party practicing a tightly focused politics – living proof that Haredi politicians were again occupying positions of power and influence. Not only did Shas do outstanding organisational and political work; it also demonstrated an impressive ability to align with the Israeli right’s core national-political agenda: the connection between security and tradition. The campaign billboards showing Aryeh Deri, Shas’s political leader, positioned alongside Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, said it all. If Likud under Netanyahu had presented itself in the decade preceding the elections as the party focused on Israeli security, Shas under Deri CONTACT Nissim Leon nissimnu@bezeqint.net Department of Sociology and Anthropology, Bar-Ilan University, Max and Anna Web st., Ramat-Gan, Israel ISRAEL AFFAIRS 2022, VOL. 28, NO. 6, 840–855 https://doi.org/10.1080/13537121.2022.2134326 © 2022 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group