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Tuesday, September 1, 2026
Polls show reshuffling of parties wouldn’t much change election picture, with anti-Netanyahu bloc just short of majority
Add ToI as a Preferred Source on GoogleA series of polls by Channel 12 shows that the Israeli electorate would remain deadlocked, albeit with the anti-Netanyahu bloc close to a Knesset majority, even if several small factions formed alliances or melded into bigger parties.
The polls, examining a series of theoretical party mergers, come about a week before the September 8 deadline when parties must submit their final electoral slates. Current polls show a group of small parties all hovering at or below the threshold of votes needed to enter the Knesset.
The network’s first poll, surveying the current electoral landscape, finds that the bloc of parties opposing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu would win 59 seats, two short of a 61-seat majority in the Knesset, while the pro-Netanyahu parties would win 50 seats. Arab parties would win 11 seats.
In that poll, the centrist Yashar party, led by Gadi Eisenkot, would win 24, followed by Netanyahu’s Likud with 23. Most of the smaller parties hovered around the same place they’ve found themselves in recent polls.
Notably, the new right-wing party People of Israel, led by ex-general Ofer Winter, would enter the Knesset with four seats, while the far-right Religious Zionism party, currently in the Knesset, would fall short.
Another poll found that if Religious Zionism merged with Moshe Feiglin’s far-right party, it would enter the Knesset with five seats but wouldn’t change the overall makeup of the blocs. The same is true if Religious Zionism united with the far-right Otzma Yehudit, as Netanyahu has pleaded for. In that case, the pro-Netanyahu bloc would gain a seat but still be short of a majority.
If, however, Religious Zionism merged into Likud, and a variety of non-aligned right-wing parties merged, the anti-Netanyahu bloc would stand at 57, while the non-aligned right would squeak into the Knesset with four seats. If that party decided to join the anti-Netanyahu bloc, it would add up to a bare majority of 61.
The Times of Israel Community.