Moshe Zalman Feiglin (; born 31 July 1962) is a right libertarian-leaning Israeli politician and activist, and the leader of libertarian Zionist party Zehut. As a member of Likud, he headed the Manhigut Yehudit (Jewish Leadership) faction within the party, and represented Likud in the Knesset between 2013 and 2015.
Prior to becoming a Knesset member, Feiglin co-founded the Zo Artzeinu ("This is our Land") movement with Shmuel Sackett in 1993 to protest the Oslo Accords. In 1995, the movement blocked eighty intersections in an act of civil disobedience, and Feiglin was sentenced to six months in prison in 1997 for sedition against the Israeli state. In 1996, Feiglin founded Manhigut Yehudit as a continuation of Zo Artzeinu. Manhigut Yehudit joined Likud in 2000. Feiglin ran for Chairman of Likud in 2002, 2005, 2007 and 2012, losing the first election to Ariel Sharon and the rest to Benjamin Netanyahu.
Feiglin was elected to the Knesset in the 2013 election as a member of Likud after winning the 13th slot in the party's electoral list primary. He lost re-election in 2015 after being demoted to the 36th slot. After the Primary, Feiglin announced his intention to leave Likud and form a new party, Zehut, which ran in the April 2019 election, winning 2.7% of the vote and failing to cross the electoral threshold. Zehut withdrew from the September 2019 election and Feiglin rejoined Likud in 2021. Feiglin again sought election to the Knesset in 2022 as a member of Likud, but won the 52nd slot on the party list and was not elected. In 2024, Feiglin left Likud and reformed Zehut, which is running jointly with the Religious Zionist Party in the 2026 election.
Biography Moshe Feiglin was born in Haifa, the son of Ya'akov Zvi and Esther Feiglin. His ancestors moved to Palestine, from Imperial Russia during the First Aliyah.Moshe Feiglin: Biography Manhigut Yehudit His grandfather was the first child born in Metula, and some of his ancestors were among the founders of several settlements, including Mishmar HaYarden, Hadera, and Kinneret. His father served in the Jewish Settlement Police during the British Mandate era. His family later moved to Rehovot, where he attended the local Tachkemoni school of the Mizrachi movement, and subsequently graduated from Rabbi Haim Drukman's Yeshivat Or Etzion. They are also related to Rebbes of The Chabad Dynasty.
During his IDF national service, Feiglin served in the Engineering Corps. He later signed on to one additional year as a career soldier, and attained the rank of captain. He fought in the 1982 Lebanon War.
Feiglin ran a company that used rope rappelling in the construction industry.
Feiglin is married, and has five children, and lives in the settlement of Karnei Shomron.
Political career Manhigut Yehudit Prior to becoming a Knesset member, Feiglin co-founded the Zo Artzeinu ("This is our Land") movement with Shmuel Sackett in 1993 to protest the Oslo Accords. On 8 August 1995, eighty intersections throughout the country were blocked in a massive act of non-violent civil disobedience against the Oslo process. As a result of his activities, Feiglin was sentenced to six months in prison in 1997 for sedition against the state by Israel's Supreme Court. The sentence was later commuted to community service.
In November 1996, Feiglin established the Manhigut Yehudit movement. It began as a brainchild of Feiglin and a friend of his, Moti Karpel, who established the organization as the continuation of the Zo Artzeinu protest movement. The main tactical difference between the two in Feiglin's thought is that Zo Artzeinu protested government policy without suggesting an alternative, whereas Manhigut Yehudit seeks to become the government and be the alternative.
Lacking the tools to do this, and without a political party with which to stake his run, he was approached by a founding member of the Likud party and participant in the Zo Artzeinu protests who proposed that Feiglin register for the Likud party and register, in turn, the thousands who participated in the protests, thereby building a support base for himself in the party, from which he could run for the party presidency and, in turn, Prime Minister.Feiglin, Moshe.מלחמת החלומות, Manhigut Yehudit: 2005, pp. 378–382
According to Feiglin's own words, Manhigut Yehudit was started to "return the country to the people and lead the State of Israel through authentic Jewish values".
Feiglin says that the movement's leadership will arise from "those who have a deep commitment to Torah values". Still, 30 percent of its present members are secular (2005). He opposes the surrender of what he regards as Jewish land, and has demanded the government take action against the estimated 50,000 illegal Arab structures built throughout the country. Feiglin has stated that Likud had "given up true Likud values and acquiesced in the Gaza evacuation".Likud Leans Farther To Right IsraCast, 9 December 2008
Likud
Manhigut Yehudit joined Likud in 2000, with Feiglin declaring that he would be a candidate for chairmanship of the party as a springboard for premiership of the State of Israel. Feiglin was a minor candidate in the 2002 Likud leadership election.
In 2005, Feiglin again ran for Likud chairman and won 12.5% of the votes, coming third out of seven candidates, after Benjamin Netanyahu and Silvan Shalom. He attempted to run for a slot on the party's Knesset list, but encountered severe opposition from Netanyahu, who delayed party elections and advocated making changes to its charter to bar "anyone who has served three or more months in prison" from running as a Likud MK. This would have prevented Feiglin, who served a six-month sentence in the mid-1990s for civil disobedience, from running for either an MK or leadership position in the future. Feiglin withdrew from the race on 3 January 2006, following the release of a statement from the Likud party election chairman declaring, in agreement with a prior decision by the Israeli High Court, that Feiglin's conviction was not for "dishonorable" violations of the law, allowing him to participate in future Likud affairs.
In the 14 August 2007 primaries, Feiglin nearly doubled his previous showing and received 23.4% of the votes to Netanyahu's 72.8%. Netanyahu, fearing a strong showing by Feiglin, tried to have him ousted from the party prior to the vote, and said he would continue such efforts. On 10 December 2008, Feiglin was won twentieth place in the Likud primaries. On 11 December, following a petition submitted against him by Ophir Akunis, he was demoted to the 36th spot.
In an article written in 2009, Feiglin stated: "Sad to say, Prime Minister Netanyahu is a pitiful puppet of Peres and his cohorts."
Feiglin ran against Netanyahu again in the 2012 Likud leadership election, held on 31 January 2012, and again received 23% of the vote. In the Likud primaries held in late 2012 to select candidates for the 2013 elections, Feiglin finished thirteenth, and was elected to the Knesset in the 2013 elections.
Feiglin served as Deputy Speaker in the 19th Knesset. He and his Manhigut Yehudit faction suffered a serious setback in the December 2014 Likud primaries, held in the run-up to the 2015 Knesset elections, when he fell to the 36th position on the Likud list, making it unlikely he would be returned to the Knesset. In January 2015, he announced that he was leaving Likud to form his own party,Moshe Feiglin Leaves Likud, Forms New Party Israel National News, 5 January 2015 after the Likud primaries the previous month. Feiglin complained about efforts that were done to try to keep him out of Israel's parliament, the Knesset. He referred to alleged political corruption in the Likud primary and legal maneuvers Benjamin Netanyahu took in the past to move him down the party’s list, accusing the prime minister of trying to assassinate him politically. As a result of said issues, as well as timing, Feiglin did not form a new party for the Knesset elections in March, and instead decided to take his time to build a strong new party ("If we have to give up on the coming Knesset to build ourselves well and fundamentally, we will do so. We will take the time that we need to build ourselves in the proper and most exacting way."). Shortly after the 2015 election, he announced that the new party was to be called Zehut (Identity). Feiglin's party is in favor of legalizing marijuana.
In July 2021, Feiglin returned to Likud. He sought election to the Knesset in 2022 as a member of Likud, but won the 52nd slot on the party list and was not elected. In January 2024, Feiglin left Likud and reestablished Zehut. The party announced it will contest the 2026 election, and on 1 September 2026, agreed on a joint run with the Religious Zionist Party, with Feiglin receiving the 2nd slot on the joint list.
Views and opinions Feiglin has openly stated that, though he is not opposed to peace, peace is not his goal,https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W6fUdpbejmM, time index 2:10 and would not be on the top of his agenda as Prime Minister. Rather, Feiglin's focus is on reforming Israel as an essentially Jewish state by acting on several campaigns on the religious, social, legal, and security fronts.
In a May 2012 article on liberty that originally appeared on the NRG Maariv Hebrew website, Feiglin wrote: "Liberty means fighting against coercion of all kinds; religious, anti-religious, economic, cultural, educational, and more. Liberty means allocating state land to the citizen. It means privatization of government firms to the public, and not to core shareholders. Liberty means liberalized communication - broadcasting license and not broadcast franchise. You want to open up a television or radio station? Buy a wavelength and broadcast as you please within the framework of the law. Liberty means restoring the responsibility for education to the parents, using the education coupon method. It means a gradual transfer to a professional volunteer army. Liberty means prohibiting biometric data bases or any other type of human designation. There is no difference in principle between sophisticated biological marking and tattooing an ID number; both turn our identities into the property of a third party. In both, we lose our freedom. Simply put: We have one G-d above us, and we should not be enslaved to another person or mechanism. The state is ours, and under no circumstance is the opposite true."
He is against religious coercion and the establishment of religious political parties, and has come out against legislation such as the Chametz Law, which forbids selling leavened products during Passover, as dictated by Jewish law. Feiglin has stated that he wants "every Jew not to eat chametz because of national honor, cultural pride. Not because of a law".
He is also a proponent of the civil marriage initiative in Israel which would allow any Israeli citizen to marry without a religious cleric. At present, marriage in Israel is impossible outside the confines of a religious system; hence, for tens of thousands of people with problematic religious status, it is impossible ever to get married in the country. The present system also places the power of divorce in the hand of the Religious courts, who are answerable only to the Supreme Courts. The civil marriage initiative would make the religious nature of marriage entirely voluntary, effectively separating religion and state in this matter.
Feiglin has advocated removing the Jerusalem Islamic Waqf's control over the entire al-Aqsa complex, and stated that a synagogue should be established on the Temple Mount. In February 2014, at Feiglin's insistence, the Knesset debated the status of the Temple Mount. Feiglin's platform states:"We have to internalize that this is our Land - exclusively... Most important: We must expel the Moslem wakf from the Temple Mount and restore exclusive Israeli sovereignty over this most holy site."