A new Channel 13 poll shows Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s Likud and Gadi Eisenkot’s Yashar party tied as Israel’s largest parties, with 21 Knesset seats each, 98 days before the election.

Likud fell by one seat from the previous poll, while Yashar remained unchanged. Naftali Bennett’s Beyachad received 14 seats, and Yair Golan’s Democrats remained at 11 following the party’s primaries.

Yisrael Beiteinu, led by Avigdor Liberman, received 10 seats. Shas and United Torah Judaism each received eight, Otzma Yehudit received seven, and Hadash-Ta’al received six. Religious Zionism, led by Bezalel Smotrich, and Ra’am, led by Mansour Abbas, each received five seats.

A list led by Chili Tropper and Yoaz Hendel again crossed the electoral threshold with four seats. Balad and Blue and White remained below the threshold.

The poll placed parties opposed to Netanyahu at 71 seats, compared with 49 seats for the Netanyahu bloc.

In a head-to-head question over suitability to serve as prime minister, Eisenkot widened his lead over Netanyahu, receiving 47% to Netanyahu’s 35%. Bennett led Netanyahu by a narrower margin of 43% to 40%.

Channel 13’s separate “poll of polls,” which averages surveys published by Israeli media outlets, placed Likud as the largest party. In that average, the coalition received 53 seats, the opposition received 57, and the Arab parties held 10 seats, leaving neither political bloc with 60 seats.

The poll also found that 45% of respondents believe the United States and Israel should renew the war with Iran, while 35% said they should not and 20% did not know.

Asked whether they feared Netanyahu could initiate a security event to disrupt the election, 48% said he might, 43% said such a scenario would not occur, and 9% were unsure.

(YWN World Headquarters – NYC)