The popularity of prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s Likud party has improved since Israel began its conflict with Iran last week.
A poll published on Friday by the Ma’ariv newspaper found that if an election were to be held, Mr Netanyahu’s ruling Likud party would register 27 seats in the Israeli Knesset, up from 24 in a similar poll last week. This is the party’s highest showing since the Hamas invasion of southern Israel on October 7th 2023. Likud holds 32 seats in the current parliament.
Yisrael Beiteinu, a rival right-wing party headed by former defence minister Avigdor Lieberman, is the second most popular party with 19 seats.
The poll predicts the right-wing and religious parties that make up Mr Netanyahu’s coalition would fail to clinch a majority, winning 51 of the 120 seats in the Knesset parliament.
However, in the event that former prime minister Naftali Bennett runs as the head of a new right-wing party in the next election – which must be held by October 2026 – the poll shows Likud dropping to 24 seats, one more than Mr Bennett’s party. Under such a scenario, the current coalition parties would drop to 46 members in the next Knesset.
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A small majority for the opposition parties at the next election might not be so bad for Mr Netanyahu. Most of the mainstream Zionist parties have indicated that they will not sit in a future coalition with two Arab parties, which together consistently poll 10 seats. If no bloc formed a working majority, Mr Netanyahu would continue as transitional prime minister.
Friday’s poll also showed that 46 per cent of Israelis believe that removing the threat of nuclear weapons and/or ballistic missiles should be the main aim of the week-old war against Iran. Some 43 per cent cited regime change.
Other polls indicate that 77-83 per cent of Israelis support the war against Iran.
