Eisenkot Leads Netanyahu in Final Israeli Polls, With Neither Bloc Securing a Majority

Gadi Eisenkot's Yashar party is ahead of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's Likud in the latest Israeli election polls, but neither main political bloc has the support needed for a parliamentary majority. With voting two days away, the surveys published over the weekend leave both sides short of the 61 seats required in the 120-seat Knesset.

The fate of smaller parties could substantially influence the final seat distribution. Israel's electoral threshold is 3.25%, and several lists are polling close to that mark. Ofer Winter's People of Israel falls below it in each of the four surveys detailed in the report, while the joint Reservists Party and Economic Party list qualifies for parliament in two.

Maariv's final pre-election survey gives the opposition's change bloc 54 seats and Netanyahu's bloc 48, a decline of three seats for the coalition compared with the previous week. Yashar remains at 21 seats. Former prime minister Naftali Bennett's B'Yachad gains two to reach 15, while Yair Golan's Democrats adds one for a total of 10. Avigdor Liberman's Yisrael Beytenu holds steady at eight.

In the same survey, United Torah Judaism and Otzma Yehudit each lose a seat, while Likud, Shas and the Religious Zionist Party each gain one. Winter's party receives 3% of the vote, leaving it outside parliament. The joint list led by former communications minister Yoaz Hendel and economist Yaron Zelekha narrowly qualifies, winning four seats.

Channel 13 puts the opposition's change bloc at 54 seats and Netanyahu's bloc at 50. Yashar takes 22 seats, followed by Likud with 19 and B'Yachad with 14. People of Israel receives 3.1%, the Hendel and Zelekha list 3%, and Moti Leitner's Haredi Public Party 1.3%, leaving all three below the entry threshold.

The KAN 11 survey places Yashar at 22 seats and Likud at 20, with both losing one seat. B'Yachad gains two to reach 14. Eisenkot's bloc has 52 seats against 50 for Netanyahu's, while the Arab parties increase their combined representation by one seat to 14. Hendel and Zelekha's list wins four seats, but People of Israel, the Haredi Public Party and Noam fail to qualify.

Channel 12 gives Yashar its strongest result among the four detailed surveys, with 23 seats, ahead of Likud's 21 and B'Yachad's 15. The opposition bloc reaches 56 seats, compared with 50 for the coalition bloc and a combined 14 for the Arab parties.

In that poll, the Hendel and Zelekha list receives 2.4%, People of Israel 2.5%, and the Haredi Public Party 0.5%. All remain outside the Knesset. Even with the opposition's higher seat total in this survey, neither major bloc reaches a majority without additional parliamentary support.