Poll indicates it’s better for Netanyahu if Shaked stays in race

A poll published today by the Knesset Channel indicates that it is better for Likud leader Benjamin Netanyahu if Ayelet Shaked stays in the race.

The poll gives indicates that Shaked’s support is strengthening from 1.8% of the vote to 2.5%, but still not enough to cross the electoral threshold.

With Shaked in the race, Netanyahu’s right-religious bloc wins 60 seats, just one short of a majority in the 120-seat Knesset.

But if she is to drop out of the race the bloc would only win 59 seats, with Shaked’s support apparently going to the Benny Gantz-Gideon Sa’ar National Unity alliance, which gains a seat from 11 to 12.

Shaked inherited the leadership of the Yamina party from former prime minister Naftali Bennett and is now running at the top of the Jewish Home party’s slate, but polls consistently indicate she will not enter the Knesset.

Most analysts have viewed her staying in the race as detrimental to Netanyahu by wasting votes for the right.