Poll: Right-wing, Kulanu, haredi parties garner 69 seats combined

A right-wing and Orthodox bloc led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party would garner 69 seats in the next Knesset if it partnered with Moshe Kahlon’s newcomer center-right party Kulanu, a new poll found.

In the survey released Friday by Israel Radio, the Likud received 23 seats, Naftali Bennett’s Jewish Home got 16 mandates, Yisrael Beytenu led by Avigdor Liberman garnered 7 seats as did the Sephardi ultra-Orthodox party Shas and the Ashkenazi United Torah Judaism. Kulanu got 9 seats.

The joint list of Labor-Hatnua led by Tzipi Livni and Isaac Herzog was still the largest single party with 24 seats, however, according to the poll. The question remains if the combined party could form a viable coalition.

Yair Lapid’s centrist party Yesh Atid got 9 and Meretz 7. The Arab parties Ra’am-Taal partnered with Balad would get 5 and the Arab-Jewish party Hadash would receive 6 Knesset seats.

Former Shas chairman Eli Yishai’s new party would not pass the electoral threshold, a finding consistent with previous polls, although it was close to receiving the requisite 3.25 percent of the vote, which is equivalent to four Knesset seats.

Forty-three percent of respondents to Friday’s poll said they prefer Netanyahu win a third successive term as prime minister, with Labor’s Isaac Herzog close behind at 41%.

Sixteen percent of those polled said the Likud’s new Knesset slate would increase its chances in the upcoming March 17 general elections.

A Channel 2 poll earlier this week found the Likud and Labor-Hatnua neck and neck with 24 seats each.