A new poll published Wednesday by Channel 13 suggests that if elections were held today, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud would retain its status as the largest party in the Knesset, even as Netanyahu makes a high-profile visit to the White House.
According to the poll, Likud would secure 26 seats, maintaining its lead over its rivals. National Unity, led by Benny Gantz, would follow with 17 seats, while Avigdor Liberman’s Yisrael Beiteinu would emerge as the third-largest party with 16 seats.
Other notable results include Yair Golan’s Democrats (12 seats), Shas (10 seats), Otzma Yehudit (9 seats), Yesh Atid (8 seats), and United Torah Judaism (UTJ) (7 seats). The Arab parties—Hadash-Taal (6 seats), Ra’am (5 seats)—and Bezalel Smotrich’s Religious Zionist Party (4 seats) round out the poll’s projections.
In terms of broader political blocs, Netanyahu’s right-wing and religious alliance would secure 56 seats, while opposition parties, excluding Arab factions, would garner 53 seats. The Arab parties collectively would control 11 seats, leaving the overall political landscape divided.
The poll also examined a scenario in which former Prime Minister Naftali Bennett re-enters politics at the helm of a new party. Under this scenario, the political landscape would shift dramatically—Bennett’s party would claim 29 seats, overtaking Likud, which would drop to 24 seats. Yesh Atid, led by Yair Lapid, would suffer a major collapse, plummeting to just 5 seats.
Bennett’s return would also weaken other parties: National Unity and Yisrael Beiteinu would drop to 9 seats each, while both the Democrats and the Arab factions would lose one seat.
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Of course if all the right-wing (nationalist) parties worked together, which probably would require several of them to give up their “jihad” against Yiddishkeit and to give up on their “crusade” to close down the yeshivos, a “Right-Religious” coalition would have an overwhelming majority.
It also might require Bibi to become “Prime Minister emeritus”, which might not be a bad thing (boomers are getting a big old to be working full time at demanding positions-time to let the kids take over).