After looking at the various political parties in Israel, the closest thing I found to actual American-style conservativism is the Tkuma Party, lead by Bezalel Smotrich. That guy is an across-the-board conservative on military, economic, AND social issues. The media says he's "far right", like how Brazil's new president is supposedly "Far right", which is appparently mainstream media speak for "Reaganesque solid conservative". True, the Tkuma Party only has two seats in the Knesset at the moment, but that's two more than Nigel Farage has in the UK Parliment. Tkuma is also in a coalition with two other conservative parties (Jewish Home and Otzma Yehudit) so together they have a joint list and form a "United Right" caucus in the Knesset of about 8 seats. They certainly have a voice in domestic government (again, unlike UKIP and now the Brexit Party have in the UK Parliament, where they have 0 seats), so IMO is the best case scenario is to hope Tkuma gains a ton of seats and forces Likud to the right.
The ideal scenario, of course, would be Bezalel Smotrich as Prime Minister but that's not happening unless all the Likud MPs have a "Come to Jesus Moses" moment and cross party lines en masse to vote for an actual hardcore conservative.
On a side note, despite the media calling him "Far right", Smotrich isn't one of those "Ultra Orthodox" rabbis running on religious issues. He's just a plain ol' regular Orthodox Jew, one that is fed up with concessions to the Islamofacists and the so-called Isreali "conservatives" caving to socialism and bending over backwards for the Gaystapo agenda. IMO he is the Gold Standard for Israeli conservativism.
As for Lieberman, he IS "ultra Orthodox" but he sounds like a whiny crybaby stabbing conservatives in the back to me, so maybe he has more in common with the USA Lieberman than we realized. It appears his party is more driven by ethnic interests (namely, Lieberman's Party Yisrael Beiteinu is for Jews of Russian ancestry), than any type of ideological dispute with the government.
I like Netenyahu, but he has become too much of a one note "Iran is bad!" politician, and yes I DO think he shares some of the blame for them being unable to form a government and elections being held again in Israel. He and the creepy "Blue & White Party" lead by his evil clone got 35 seats each, forcing them to reply on the minor parties to govern. Basically, they tied. If Likud had won more seats, they wouldn't have to go begging to crybabies like Lieberman for their support anyway. Likud should have done a lot better. Shades of Newt Gingrich losing five seats during the Clinton impeachment or that kooky far-left wackjob Jeremy Corbyn nearly winning a majority after Theresa May "called an election" to "strengthen her hand". The national "conservative" party performed very poorly. Unacceptable.
Let's hope they do better this time around.
“but are there ACTUAL policy differences? I’m not seeing any. Meh. “
Easy. Likud talks about supporting outposts in Judah and Samariah, and then, under Bibi, tears them down. He “supports” further Jewish presence in Chevron, but gave 75% of it to the PA. Then, after 18 months of non-stop shooting at the Jewish neighborhood residents, Tzahal had to go in and re-take the high ground in a pitched battle that cost 25 soldiers, including the colonel commanding the mission. Likud makes all the big speeches, and did all the big givebacks, such as the Sinai, Ghaza, Chevron... Naftali Bennett opposes the tearing down of outposts, and opposes any further concessions. Maybe he’s a liar, too, but I’m willing to at least give him a chance.
Interesting read:
https://jewishweek.timesofisrael.com/israels-new-kingmaker/
And a nice historic fact: Smotrich’s Tkuma Party vehemently opposed Israel’s unilateral withdrawal from the Gaza Strip, while Likud (lead by Ariel Sharon at the time) reluntantly supported it because they bought the idea that it giving up land to the Palestinians would result in “peace” in Gaza.
Guess who ended up on the wrong side of history?
I don’t know. I vote right of Likud, not because I particularly dislike Bibi, but the Likud is very much a center-right party (think Myth Romney). It’s gotten a bit better, but the equivalent to RINOs is strong there.
And, for a long time, I considered Gush Katif my home.
So, just the sake of my synagogue, like Bibi or not, I owe Bibi a punch in the face.
And the destruction of my home is why I have been mainly living as a pseudo ex-pat in the USA.