With just two weeks to go before Israel’s election, the political chessboard is set — and there is little indication that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has found a winning move.
Israel’s prime minister is not elected directly by voters but must assemble a coalition commanding a majority of the Knesset’s 120 seats. That means Benjamin Netanyahu’s chances of retaining power depend in part on how well his smaller political allies perform at the polls.
There are 38 parties running in these elections, although no more than 15 will meet the 3.25% vote threshold – the percentage of the total vote that a party needs to clear to gain any seats in the Knesset. The parties that will be left standing after the Oct. 27 vote will likely include three or four on the right, led by Netanyahu’s Likud list; four or five on the center-left, with polling showing the new Yashar party led by Gadi Eizenkot, a former military chief of staff, leading them; two Haredi Orthodox parties; and two predominantly Arab parties.
Unfortunately for Netanyahu, several right-wing parties didn’t merge as he had hoped. Religious Zionism, the ultra-nationalist party led by Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, did not join forces with National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir’s Otzma Yehudit or Amcha Yisrael, led by retired Brig. Gen. Ofer Winter.
As a result, both Smotrich’s party and Winter’s party remain close to Israel’s electoral threshold, raising the possibility that one or both could fail to win enough votes to enter the Knesset — which means their votes, which could have strengthened Netanyahu’s bloc, will be wasted. With the 3.25% threshold the equivalent of four Knesset seats, the wasted vote could be substantial.
“Netanyahu has been considered Israel’s political magician for many years — the man who managed in 2022 to bring Ben-Gvir and Smotrich together on a joint list,” said Dr. Gayil Talshir, a political scientist at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
Ahead of that election, Netanyahu publicly urged the two parties to merge, warning that the right-wing bloc “can’t take the risk” of either party falling below the electoral threshold. Days later, the two leaders reached a deal following a meeting with Netanyahu, who had pressed for the merger.
“We haven’t seen that happen in this election,” Talshir continued. “Netanyahu is entering this election in the weakest position we have seen him in over the past decade in terms of the parties running.”
The right-wing parties’ decisions to run separately reflected a combination of personal animosity and ideological differences. Winter emphasized the need to bring new faces into politics, arguing that those tainted by the failures behind Hamas’ invasion of southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, should make way for new leadership. Smotrich and Ben-Gvir, meanwhile, remained divided by personal tensions and the belief that each appeals to a somewhat different segment of Israel’s ultranationalist right.
Veteran pollster Shmuel Rosner believes Winter’s new party risks falling below the threshold. It is currently polling at around four to five seats, but support for new parties has traditionally declined as the initial excitement surrounding their launch fades. Smotrich’s Religious Zionism, which is polling at roughly five to six seats, is also vulnerable. The party has spent a significant amount of time below the threshold in polling in recent months.
“The party lineup is more challenging for Netanyahu than for his opponents,” Rosner said. “In the anti-Netanyahu camp, there is currently no party that is at risk of falling below the electoral threshold, while in the bloc that leans toward Netanyahu, there is at least one — and potentially another — party in that position.”
Even if both parties clear the threshold, however, current polling suggests that Netanyahu remains well short of the 61 seats needed to form a governing coalition. Most polls put his bloc at around 52 to 53 seats.
But the picture is not entirely bleak for Netanyahu. The opposition-aligned bloc, currently led by former military chief Gadi Eisenkot, is also not projected to reach 61 seats. In recent weeks, its numbers have fallen sharply, from roughly 58-59 seats to around 52-53. The balance of the seats go to Arab-led parties.
Talshir attributes that decline not necessarily to a loss of support for the bloc itself, but to changes elsewhere in the electoral map. Three Arab parties have joined forces to make up a unified Joint List party, strengthening the Arab political bloc and helping one of the parties avoid falling below the electoral threshold. The merger could also increase turnout among Arab voters.
Both major political camps have pledged not to include the Arab parties in a governing coalition. However, here too, the anti-Netanyahu bloc is in a better position.
Joint List and Ra’am are projected to win roughly 14 seats. And the leader of Balad, one of the parties making up the Joint List, withdrew from the race late last month after the Supreme Court signaled that his candidacy would be disqualified. The impact of his forced withdrawal remains unclear, but some analysts suggest it could further boost turnout among Arab voters, who may cast protest votes against those who prevented him from running.
Netanyahu’s potential coalition members are adamantly opposed to including any Arab parties in their coalition, and have made the possibility of a coalition that includes an Arab party a line of attack against the opposition bloc. The previous government, formed by Naftali Bennett and Yair Lapid in 2021, brought Ra’am into its coalition to secure a parliamentary majority – a history-making first.
But key figures in the current opposition camp have pledged not to repeat that arrangement this time, saying that emotions remain too raw in the Jewish public three years after the Oct. 7, 2023 deadly Hamas raids inside Israel. Those ruling out another partnership with Arab parties include Gadi Eisenkot, the current leader of the opposition camp in the polls; Lapid, who helped engineer the previous coalition; and Avigdor Lieberman, the hawkish former finance minister.
Talshir nevertheless believes that those commitments could ultimately be tested if the election produces another deadlock. She points to a possible scenario in which Eisenkot and Ra’am could cooperate to establish a minority government, with Ra’am voting to install an Eisenkot-led list while remaining outside the coalition in order to prevent Netanyahu from remaining prime minister.
Abbas told Channel 12 in an interview in August that his top priority was replacing Netanyahu’s current government. And on Saturday, Joint List chairman Youssef Jabareen said his party would be willing to support any government that ends Netanyahu’s rule, subject to conditions he did not specify.
If neither bloc can assemble a coalition, Israel could once again find itself heading toward another election — as happened during the two-year political crisis that began in 2019 and led to five subsequent elections — while Netanyahu would remain in office as caretaker prime minister.
“Looking at the scenarios and the polls we are seeing right now, we see a very small chance that either bloc will be able to reach 61 seats,” Rosner said.
One of the biggest wild cards is the handful of parties currently polling below the electoral threshold that have nevertheless decided to remain in the race.
Rosner points to three notable parties in that position: The Reservists-Economic Party led by Yoaz Hendel and Yaron Zelekha; the Haredi-oriented party led by Moti Leitner; and Benny Gantz’s Blue and White.
The most significant of the three, Rosner said, is the Hendel-Zelekha party, which is hovering around the electoral threshold and could either cross it or fall short. “It is on the edge of the threshold,” Rosner said. “It could pass or fall with four seats.”
The party, he added, is difficult to place politically. “It doesn’t really say what it will do, and it is made up of people who have different interests and different desires,” Rosner said. Still, he estimates that it would be easier for the party to join the opposition-aligned bloc than Netanyahu’s coalition, in part because of the coalition’s partnership with the Haredi parties. Military reservists deeply resent Haredi men who avoid serving in the military and want the next government to end the practice.
Gantz’s Blue and White, which once led the opposition camp but lost much of its popularity after Gantz joined Netanyahu’s government, is still running despite remaining well below the threshold. It is currently polling at around 1%.Gantz has made clear that if his party clears the electoral threshold, he would seek to form a unity government that includes both Netanyahu and parties from the opposition’s change bloc.
The new Haredi party, HaTzibbur HaHaredi, is polling at a similar level. It could draw one or two seats away from the established ultra-Orthodox parties, potentially weakening Netanyahu’s bloc. The party has said it would support a “broad national government,” without specifying which political camp it would join.
For now, the key question is not so much whether voters will switch sides, but whether each bloc can mobilize its existing supporters to turn out on election day.
“The struggle right now is much less about moving voters from one side to the other and much more about making sure voters leave their homes and vote,” Rosner said. “And I estimate that the more difficult test will be for the right-wing bloc.”
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