Miri Regev (senior Likud minister; ex-Culture & Sport Minister) — Davar interview, Sep 2022: positioning herself as the voice of the periphery against the center/elite — "they see me as their mouthpiece, and their representative" — and waging culture war on the Tel Aviv establishment: "I made it clear that culture was not born in Tel Aviv." The Likud populist-nationalist / Mizrahi-periphery / anti-elite pole.

You have to understand that in Israeli society, there are still very large gaps between the periphery and the center; There are people who don't have the opportunity and the tools to fight in an equal way, and they see me as their mouthpiece, and their representative.

I made it clear that culture was not born in Tel Aviv.

[Source is English (Davar's English edition, interview/profile dated 5 September 2022; Davar — the Histadrut labor federation's outlet — translating her Hebrew interview); tier-2, confirmed verbatim against the fetched page.] Declared positions of Miri Regev — a senior Likud politician and longtime cabinet minister (Culture & Sport 2015–2020, then Transportation, and a deputy prime minister), a former IDF spokeswoman, and the most prominent POPULIST-NATIONALIST and Mizrahi-identity voice of the Israeli right. A fierce Netanyahu loyalist, Regev built her politics on channeling the grievances of the PERIPHERY (the largely Mizrahi, working-class towns outside the Tel Aviv center) against the veteran Ashkenazi-liberal "elite": "There are people who don't have the opportunity and the tools to fight in an equal way, and they see me as their mouthpiece, and their representative." As Culture Minister she waged open war on the (Tel Aviv, left-leaning) cultural establishment — "I made it clear that culture was not born in Tel Aviv" — championing the periphery, pushing to condition state arts funding on "loyalty," and asserting a Jewish (over merely "Israeli") national identity. This is the ISRAELI POPULIST-NATIONALIST / MIZRAHI-PERIPHERY / ANTI-ELITE pole within the Likud right — a majoritarian, identity-and-grievance politics pitting "the people" and the periphery against the old Ashkenazi cultural and judicial elites — a distinct cleavage (ethnic-class resentment + cultural majoritarianism) from Israel Katz's security-establishment Likud, Simcha Rothman's legal-constitutional project, and the settler (Orit Strock) and religious-conservative (Avi Maoz) right. [Axes: social cleavage / identity (Mizrahi-periphery vs Ashkenazi-center; ethnic-class grievance), populism (the people / periphery vs the "elite"; "mouthpiece" of the marginalized), culture / democracy (majoritarian culture war; funding loyalty; against the liberal cultural establishment), nationalism (Jewish over secular-"Israeli" identity; Netanyahu loyalism).]