Netanyahu, Eisenkot stake rival claims to lead Israel after deadlocked vote

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and rival Gadi Eisenkot offered competing claims to lead Israel after Tuesday's election, with Netanyahu calling for a right-wing government and Eisenkot saying voters had rejected the longtime Israeli leader, even as early counting showed no clear winner.

Voter turnout was 77.7%, Israel's Central Elections Committee said, the highest in more than 2 decades

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· Posted: Oct 28, 2026 5:43 AM EDT | Last Updated: 10 minutes ago

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No clear winner in pivotal Israeli election, exit polls suggest

7 hours ago|

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4:38

Israeli exit polls show no clear winner in the national election widely seen as a referendum on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's leadership. Neither Netanyahu nor his main rival Gadi Eisenkot appear to have secured a governing majority.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and rival Gadi Eisenkot offered competing claims to lead Israel after Tuesday's election, with Netanyahu calling for a right-wing government and Eisenkot saying voters had rejected the longtime Israeli leader, even as early counting showed no clear winner.

Israel's Central Elections Committee was tallying votes on Wednesday and it will likely take until Thursday before definitive results of the election — the first since the Hamas-led attack of Oct. 7, 2023 — are known.

With some 48.4 per cent of votes tallied, Netanyahu's bloc was projected to win 55 seats, and Eisenkot's bloc 50 seats, with 15 seats going to Arab parties, Israeli media reported — a distribution will likely change as more votes are tallied.

That leaves both sides short of the 61 seats needed for a majority in the 120-seat Knesset, and neither Netanyahu nor Eisenkot claimed victory.

While the projected results may represent a setback for Netanyahu and his nationalist-religious coalition, a deadlock could work in his favour, leaving the 77-year-old in office as a caretaker prime minister during what are likely to be prolonged coalition negotiations or even until another election can be held.

An aide speaks to Likud Leader Benjamin Netanyahu as he gives a statement following exit polls for Israel's national election, at the party's election headquarters in Jerusalem early Wednesday. (Ammar Awad/Reuters)

Netanyahu's bloc ruled out forming a government with Arab parties, which themselves campaigned on a platform of bringing down the prime minister and his far-right allies. Eisenkot, the leader of the Yashar party and a former military chief, has all but ruled out forming a government with Arab parties, complicating his path to power.

Far-right religious parties led by Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich were projected to take a combined 13 seats within Netanyahu's bloc — with no major gains for either of them.

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Netanyahu, addressing party faithful after 3 a.m. local time at Likud election headquarters in Jerusalem, called for the formation of "a strong, right-wing national government."

Trump backed Netanyahu

He also highlighted Israel's military successes and raised the prospect of renewed joint action with U.S. President Donald Trump against Iran.

"Israel faces a singular historical opportunity, together with our partner President Trump, to remove the existential threat of Iran once and for all. But ulterior motives must not divert us from this sacred mission," he said.

Trump, who endorsed Netanyahu, was asked early on Wednesday about the election after a campaign trip to Texas, and said he did very well.

Supporters of Gadi Eisenkot react after the release of the first exit poll results in Israel's general election in Tel Aviv on Tuesday. (Ariel Schalit/The Associated Press)

"You know, it's pretty close, which was very well. Because I think when the endorsement went out, it helped him a lot, but I actually heard he did pretty well. It might be winning or tie. The tie is sort of considered a win in that case because it's a big chess match."

Eisenkot said the public had voted against Netanyahu remaining prime minister and urged him to retire from politics, while warning against the use of Israel's security for political purposes.

High voter turnout

"Netanyahu is a caretaker prime minister, without a mandate or the people's trust," Eisenkot said, calling on the security establishment to "stand firm" against any attempt to put political interests ahead of Israel's security.

Voter turnout was 77.7 per cent, Israel's Central Elections Committee said, the highest in more than two decades and around seven percentage points higher than in 2022.

Israel's fragmented political system leaves smaller parties potential kingmakers in coalition negotiations that have run to weeks or months after past elections. If neither bloc can form a government, another vote may need to be held, something Eisenkot opposed given the high voter turnout.

No clear winner

If projections hold, Netanyahu's right-wing bloc, which at its height held 68 seats, would fall short of the 61 needed to govern, leaving him with no clear path to forming a government.

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Eisenkot, 66, who lost a son and two nephews in the Gaza war, emerged as Netanyahu's strongest challenger, stressing his security credentials while positioning himself as a centrist domestically.

He entered politics only four years ago and joined Netanyahu's war cabinet after the 2023 Hamas attack, but quit eight months later, criticizing the prime minister's leadership.

A man walks past a Likud party campaign banner in Tel Aviv on Tuesday, featuring Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and U.S. President Donald Trump, with a Hebrew message reading, 'We have one opportunity to win.' (Baz Ratner/The Associated Press)

Eisenkot offers a break with Netanyahu's leadership and far-right allies, but not with the hawkish approach to security that has become more entrenched since the 2023 Hamas attack. He opposes Palestinian statehood and says Hamas' military wing must be destroyed or dismantled.

Eisenkot says Israel's response — a war that has killed more than 74,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza health authorities — was a failure because Hamas remains in charge.

Voters grappled with the trauma of Israel's deadliest day, when Hamas killed 1,200 people, according to Israeli government tallies, and took 251 hostage, and the wars in Gaza and with Lebanon's Hezbollah and Iran that followed.

While Netanyahu was criticized for the country's biggest security failure, he argued that he had made Israel and the world safer by killing top leaders of Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran.