Netanyahu’s future in balance as opposition fails to deliver knockout blow
Tel Aviv: Benjamin Netanyahu’s opponents have begun negotiating on how to force him from office after Israeli voters swung decisively away from his right-wing government, without awarding the bloc of Zionist parties enough seats to win power in their own right.
With neither the pro nor anti-Netanyahu bloc having a clear path to majority government, the result sets the stage for days, and possibly weeks, of horse-trading.
Netanyahu’s Likud outperformed many pre-election opinion surveys to emerge as Israel’s single biggest party after an energetic election-day effort to drive the party’s traditional conservative supporters to the polls.
A surge in voter turnout from Arab-Israeli voters has seen the two Arab party lists on track to win 17 or 18 seats in the Israeli parliament, up from 10 in the last elections in 2022.
The exit poll from Israel’s Channel 12, one of the main networks, shows the opposition bloc scoring 52 seats, Netanyahu’s bloc 50 and the Arab parties 18.
Sixty-one seats are required to form a majority in the Knesset, the Israeli parliament, although it is possible to serve in a minority government.
The results mark a significant decline for Netanyahu’s right-wing bloc given it won 64 seats at the most recent elections in 2022. That number rose to 68 over the course of the term.
But it is not the definitive repudiation that the anti-Netanyahu Zionist opposition had been hoping for in the first elections since the October 7 massacre of 2023.
Gadi Eisenkot, the former military chief who emerged as Netanyahu’s top rival, leapt upon the results to claim they showed voters wanted a change, and declared it would be a mistake to go back to elections.
“Netanyahu should retire from political life,” he said in a statement to supporters.
“The initial exit poll results indicate a total vote of no confidence in Netanyahu and his October 7 government by the Zionist majority and the majority of Israel’s citizens,” Eisenkot said in an earlier statement.
“If these are the final results, this is a victory for Israel’s civic-minded Zionist majority.
“I will act immediately to implement the people’s verdict, replace Netanyahu’s government, and form a Zionist government committed to military conscription as soon as possible.”
If no leader can form a government, then Israelis will return to elections again, as happened repeatedly between 2019 and 2022.
Former prime minister Naftali Bennett said: “We will do everything, without ego, to establish a Zionist Alliance of Servants government, a government of doers, that will manage the country responsibly and serve all the People of Israel!”
United Arab List chairman Mansour Abbas said he hoped the opposition bloc and his party will secure a majority and oust Netanyahu.
“I hope that the numbers will work out and we, the Bloc of Change and the UAL, can ensure that there are 61 Knesset seats,” he said.
Avigdor Lieberman, head of the secular nationalist Yisrael Beiteinu party, told supporters the final results could still change as hundreds of thousands of absentee ballots cast by on-duty soldiers are counted in the coming days.
He said it was unlikely many soldiers would support ultra-Orthodox parties, key Netanyahu allies or the Arab parties, and there will be a “much clearer picture” later this week.
Lieberman is a fierce adversary of Netanyahu, but he has also said he will not sit in a government that includes Arab parties.
Dan Shapiro, a former United States ambassador to Israel, said Netanyahu “has no path to a government”.
“Eisenkot’s bloc does, working with the Arab parties who appear likely to receive a record 17-18 seats,” he said on social media.
“Israeli democracy has created this important opportunity for change.”
Former Israeli intelligence official Danny Citrinowicz said the world faced a “dangerous situation” as Netanyahu could seek a confrontation with Iran to try to stay in power.
“This is a very plausible scenario and one that should not be underestimated,” he said.
“The concern is not simply that Netanyahu might exploit another war for political future.
“It is that his inability to form a government, combined with his determination to remain prime minister, could create a powerful incentive to initiate or escalate a confrontation with Iran.”
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