Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's Likud party gained one seat this week, bringing the coalition bloc into a tie with the opposition bloc at 52 seats each, according to a Maariv poll released Friday, amid memorial events and protests marking the third anniversary of the October 7 massacre.
The opposition bloc lost one seat after Yair Golan's Democrats dropped by one mandate, while the other parties in the bloc remained unchanged. Within the coalition, National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir's Otzma Yehudit party lost one seat, while the Religious Zionist Party gained one. The Arab parties maintained their combined strength of 12 seats.
Respondents were asked, "If elections to the Knesset were held today, which party would you vote for?" Gadi Eisenkot's Yashar party led the poll with 21 seats, followed closely by Likud with 20 and Naftali Bennett's B'yachad with 13. The Democrats and Yisrael Beytenu each received nine seats, while Otzma Yehudit secured eight.
The Joint Arab List, United Torah Judaism, and Shas each received seven seats, followed by the Religious Zionist Party with six and Ra'am with five. Amcha Yisrael and the Reservists and Economic Party rounded out the list with four seats each.
Opposition voters show greater motivation to vote
The poll found that 78% of respondents were certain they would vote in the upcoming elections, while another 18% said they expected to vote. The remaining 4% indicated they were unlikely to cast a ballot.
Opposition supporters expressed greater motivation to vote, with 86% of those planning to support an opposition party saying they were certain they would cast a ballot, compared with 81% of coalition supporters.
In head-to-head comparisons of candidates' suitability to serve as prime minister, Yashar chairman Gadi Eisenkot maintained his six-percentage-point lead over Netanyahu, receiving 46% support compared with the prime minister's 40%. The gap was unchanged from the previous poll.
Netanyahu, however, narrowed the gap with former prime minister Naftali Bennett to just two percentage points. Bennett received 44% support, compared with 42% for Netanyahu.
The prime minister also held a six-percentage-point lead over Yisrael Beytenu chairman Avigdor Liberman, receiving 44% support compared with Liberman's 38%.
Majority oppose Arab party joining next coalition
The poll also found that 59% of Israelis oppose an Arab party joining the governing coalition after the elections, while 36% support such a move and 5% said they did not know.
By contrast, 53% of Israelis support including a haredi (ultra-Orthodox) party in the next governing coalition, while 41% oppose it and 6% said they did not know.
When asked whom they would prefer to serve as prime minister after the elections, 38% of Israelis chose Netanyahu, followed by Eisenkot with 24% and Bennett with 14%. All other candidates received single-digit levels of support.
The poll was conducted on October 7 and 8 among a representative sample of Israeli adults aged 18 and older, including Jewish and Arab respondents.
The poll was conducted by Lazar Research, headed by Dr. Menachem Lazar, in cooperation with Panel4ALL. A total of 4,667 people were invited to participate in the survey, with 700 completing it, matching the initial sample size of 700. The maximum margin of sampling error was 3.7 percentage points.