A Channel 13 poll released Wednesday evening suggests Gadi Eisenkot’s Yashar party will become the largest party in the next Knesset if general elections are held today.
While this is the first time the former IDF chief of staff has overtaken Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud in the polls, Jewish opposition parties remain three seats short of the 61 needed to form a government.
To form a governing coalition, the bloc must win a majority in 61 of the 120 seats in the Knesset. To win a seat in the Knesset, a party must receive at least 3.25 percent of the vote.
Haaretz Podcast
“We need allies, not just more security cameras”: Reform movement leader Rick Jacobs on the growing “isolation” of US Jews
play
Haaretz Podcast
“We need allies, not just more security cameras”: Reform movement leader Rick Jacobs on the growing “isolation” of US Jews
Volume: 0.5
X1
general— : —time0:00
fast forward
play
rewind
According to a Channel 13 poll on Wednesday, Yasar would win 23 seats if elections were held today – two more than in the channel’s previous poll. Netanyahu’s Likud party trails with 22 seats, having gained one seat in polls taken last week.
Click here to view Haaretz Israel 2026 poll results.
Although several parties gain or lose seats, the poll does not indicate any changes in the voting blocs. Parties currently in the coalition are projected to win 51 of the 120 Knesset seats, while opposition parties will win 69 seats, including 11 for the two Arab-majority parties.
As numerous recent opinion polls have shown, Jewish opposition parties do not have a majority without Arab parties.
Related articles
Although early elections position former Prime Minister Naftali Bennett as the leading candidate to replace Netanyahu as the next prime minister, recent polls position Eisenkot as the new leading candidate, with a Channel 12 News poll on Monday showing Yashar and Likud head-to-head. On the question of suitability for the premiership, Eisenkot also surpassed Netanyahu.
As Eisenkot’s popularity soared in the polls, Likud campaign officials also shifted the campaign’s focus from former Prime Minister Naftali Bennett to Eisenkot.
Close
Gadi Eizenkot, last year. Credit: Oliver Fitoussi
Gadi Eizenkot, last year. Credit: Oliver Fitoussi
Last month, Israeli Education Minister Yoav Kish said he could not rule out a scenario in which the Likud party would join the government led by Gadi Eisenkot. Referring to Netanyahu’s statement at a news conference on Saturday calling for a broad coalition after the next elections, Kisch called on opposition parties to reconsider their position.
“I know (opposition parties) are boycotting Likud and the right, but maybe they will change. I hope,” he said.
Kish’s statement came shortly after Gadi Eizenkot accused the Likud of racism over a campaign video mocking his English language skills. Likud’s attack on Eisenkot’s English was intended to highlight Netanyahu’s fluency in the language, a common argument among the prime minister’s supporters over the years.
“They are scared, I can see their fear,” Eisenkot said, hinting that his rise in recent polls was a motivating factor in the Likud attack.
In an interview with Ynet, the Yashar leader said: “I ask myself, where was Netanyahu’s excellent English on October 7? Did he help us with anything?
Bennett’s Together party, created earlier this year through a merger with Yesh Atid’s Yair Lapid, will become the third-largest party in the next Knesset with 15 seats, according to a poll Wednesday.
Close
Israeli opposition leader and former military commander Gadi Eisenkot at his party’s election campaign conference last month. Photo: Hadas Parush
Israeli opposition leader and former military commander Gadi Eisenkot at his party’s election campaign conference last month. Photo: Hadas Parush
The poll also projects that two additional opposition parties – the center-left Democrats led by former IDF deputy chief Yair Golan and Yisrael Beiteinu led by nationalist hardliner Avigdor Lieberman – will win 10 seats each.
The ultra-Orthodox parties Shas and United Torah Judaism, as well as the far-right Otzma Yehudit party led by National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, are tied for the second largest among coalition parties, with eight seats each.
The Arab-majority Hadash Ta’al and United Arab List parties would win six and five seats respectively, while Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich’s far-right Religious Zionism party would win five seats, according to the poll.
The poll also showed that some parties will not pass the 3.25 percent electoral threshold needed to enter the Knesset. Reservist leader Yoaz Hendel, who announced earlier this week that he would run for office alongside former Blue and White lawmaker Chili Tropper, received 2.2 percent of the vote, according to the poll.
Former Prime Minister Benny Gantz’s Blue and White party, which won 35 seats at its peak, is projected to win just 2.1 percent of the vote. The Palestinian nationalist Balad party is unlikely to reach the threshold with just 1.7 percent of the vote, according to the poll.
The Channel 13 poll was conducted by Hamadad (Shmuel Rosner and Noah Slepkow) in partnership with Project Hamidgam (Dr. Ariel Ayalon), Askaria (Dudi Dror) and Stat-Net (Yosef Maklada). The number of respondents and sampling error were not specified.