Democrats Party chairman Yair Golan responded Sunday to a viral AI-generated image portraying him dressed in traditional chareidi attire, using the opportunity to issue a sharp political pledge regarding the role of chareidi parties in Israel’s next government.

The image, which circulated widely on social media, showed Golan wearing a streimel and long peyos. In response, Golan posted a message drawing a firm political line ahead of the coming election campaign and any future coalition negotiations.

“I saw that a picture of me with a streimel is being circulated,” Golan wrote, before adding a direct promise to his supporters: “The Democrats will be your insurance policy that the chareidi parties will sit in the opposition in the coming years.”

Golan’s statement appeared aimed at energizing the secular base of his party, which unites representatives from the Labor and Meretz camps. However, political analysts quickly pointed to what they described as serious political and mathematical obstacles facing such a strategy.

According to current polling data, excluding the chareidi parties from any coalition would make it nearly impossible for the existing opposition bloc to reach a majority of 61 Knesset seats without relying on Arab parties.

Numerically, surveys indicate that once the chareidi parties are ruled out, the center-left bloc is effectively left with only one theoretical path toward forming a coalition: direct dependence on Arab factions such as Ra’am and Hadash-Ta’al.

That possibility, however, faces strong resistance from other opposition figures.

Leaders of center-right opposition parties — including Yisrael Beiteinu chairman Avigdor Lieberman and Beyachad party leader Naftali Bennett — have repeatedly stated during both previous and current election campaigns that they would refuse to join any government dependent on Arab party support.

The result, according to political observers, is a clear arithmetic deadlock.

Without the chareidi parties on one side, and with Bennett and Lieberman maintaining an absolute veto against Arab parties on the other, the center-left bloc currently has no realistic mathematical path to forming a governing coalition after elections.

Analysts noted that Golan’s declaration effectively leaves the balance of power in the hands of the right-wing bloc while placing left-wing parties at a significant numerical disadvantage that may be impossible to overcome.