Polls results in Israel shows 60 seats for Netanyahu and 55 for Lapid in the upcoming Israeli elections
A new opinion poll in Israel, Tuesday, showed that the bloc of Benjamin Netanyahu, head of the Likud party, won 60 seats, the bloc of his rival Yair Lapid, head of the “There is a Future” party, got 55 seats, and the Joint Arab List got 5 seats, according to official Israeli media.
The announcement of the results of the poll conducted for the private Israeli Kan TV channel, which is affiliated with the official broadcaster, comes two days before the deadline for the parties to submit their lists of candidates in preparation for the Knesset elections in early November.
Both Netanyahu and Lapid need a threshold of 61 out of the 120 Knesset seats to form a government.
According to the results, the opposition leader Netanyahu’s party (Likud-Right) won 32 seats, while its allies in the “Religious Zionism” party alliance got 12, and the religious parties “Shas” and “United Torah Judaism” got 9 and 7 seats, respectively, total of 60 seats .
While Prime Minister Lapid’s party (There is a Future-Centre) consolidated its gains in the polls, winning for the first time 24 seats, and its allies, the “Official Camp” (the Blue and White coalition led by Defense Minister Benny Gantz and the “New Hope” party led by Justice Minister Gideon Sa’ar) over 12 seats.
His allies, Labor, Yisrael Beitenu, and Meretz each won 5 seats, and the United Arab List led by Mansour Abbas (a partner in the current coalition) got 4 seats (a total of 55).
The Joint Arab List (the alliance of 3 Arab parties in Israel) won 5 seats, and it refuses to join Netanyahu’s coalition and has not agreed to join Lapid.
The Jewish Home party, led by Interior Minister Ayalet Shaked, didn’t exceed the threshold of 3.25% of the vote to be in parliament.
In light of political crises, the upcoming elections are the fifth in less than four years, during which Netanyahu succeeded once in forming a short-lived government in partnership with Gantz.
Israeli observers do not rule out calling for new elections, if all parties fail to form a government.
