However, the government collapsed in December 2014,[2] and an early election was mandated for 17 March 2015,[3] over two years earlier than necessary.

[4] An early poll showed that the prime minister would lose to Gideon Sa'ar in the primary;[5] so, Netanyahu asked the Likud Central Committee to move up the 6 January date to 31 December, to make sure that Sa'ar didn't have the time to mount a campaign.

[7] The motion was put to the 3,000 member central committee, who voted in a mini-referendum via secret ballot at ten polling stations throughout the country on 10 December 2014.

[16] Shai Galili, the comptroller of the party, called for an investigative hearing which would focus on Netanyahu's supposed use of "party resources" to further his candidacy during the Likud primary; the hearing resulted in Netanyahu's disqualification as a candidate for both chairman and a place on the election list.

[5] In the primary vote for spots on the Likud's electoral list for the Knesset elections, incumbent MKs Moshe Feiglin and Tzipi Hotovely, both on the right-wing of the party, failed to win spots high enough on the list to realistically have a chance of being elected to the Knesset, while Internal Affairs minister Gilad Erdan won the second spot on the list, behind Nethanyahu, and Miri Regev rose to the 4th slot, up from 12th.