Israeli exit polls show Netanyahu coalition losing majority, no bloc at 61

Exit polls broadcast by Israeli television networks after voting ended on Tuesday night project that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's governing coalition will lose its majority in the Knesset, Israel's parliament. Barak Ravid of Axios reported that the bloc led by his challenger, Gadi Eisenkot, also falls below the 61 seats needed to govern, and The Jerusalem Post described the two camps as deadlocked, with neither reaching a majority.

Polling stations closed at 10 p.m., and the networks published their projections for the 26th Knesset shortly afterwards, Israel Hayom reported, noting that turnout during the day had been notably high. The Times of Israel characterised the early numbers as a rejection of the present coalition, while leaving open what kind of government might replace it.

What an exit poll is, and what it is not

Israeli exit polls are projections produced for television channels on election night, based on surveys of voters. They are released as soon as polls close and set the tone for the first hours of coverage, but they are estimates. The binding figures are the official vote counts, which come in over the following hours and days. Seat projections for smaller parties are especially sensitive, because a party that falls just short of the electoral threshold receives no seats at all, and its votes effectively drop out of the calculation for everyone else.

Forming a government in Israel requires a coalition commanding a majority of 61 in the Knesset. Because no single party has ever won that many seats alone, the arithmetic of blocs, and of which parties are willing to sit together, matters as much as which party finishes first.

How the parties are projected to fare

The Jerusalem Post published a series of party-by-party projections drawn from the exit polls:

• Arab parties: Ra'am and the Joint List were projected to win a combined 19 seats, which the Post linked to high turnout. Joint List chairman Yousef Jabareen gathered with supporters at the party's headquarters in Nazareth, a city in northern Israel.
• Haredi (ultra-Orthodox) parties: Shas and United Torah Judaism (UTJ) were projected in a range of 12-15 seats, according to the Post.
• B'Yachad: Naftali Bennett's party was projected at 12-13 seats, the Post reported.
• The Democrats: Yair Golan's party was projected to win nine seats, according to the Post, and party members were photographed celebrating in Tel Aviv.
• Yisrael Beytenu: Avigdor Liberman's party was projected at 7-8 seats, the Post reported.

A different reading of the Arab vote

Not every outlet gave the same figure for the Arab parties. The Hebrew-language Telegram channel Abu Ali Express, summarising what it called the clear conclusions across all the polls, put the Arab parties at roughly 17 seats, describing this as an increase of about 70% on their previous strength. That is lower than the 19 seats cited by The Jerusalem Post. The gap may reflect differences between individual network polls, but the reports do not explain it, and both figures are projections rather than results.

The same channel said Likud remained the largest single party, and that the parties associated with Winter and with Zelicha and Hendel did not clear the electoral threshold in the polls. It cautioned that it was too early to declare which camp had won and that, on most other questions, readers should wait for the real results.

Where this leaves the two camps

Taken together, the reports describe an outcome in which the current coalition no longer holds a majority, but the opposition camp led by Eisenkot does not reach one either. Parties outside both blocs, including the Arab parties and others whose alignment is not settled, may therefore carry more weight in any coalition negotiations. The reports themselves do not say which parties have committed to which camp.

What the reports do not say

• None of the material gives a full seat count for each bloc, so it is not possible to say from these reports how far short of 61 either side falls.
• The reports do not say which television networks produced which figures, or how much the individual polls differed from one another.
• The Jerusalem Post's range of 12-15 seats for Shas and UTJ does not make clear whether it refers to the two parties together or to each separately.
• Only one source, Abu Ali Express, reported that Likud is the largest party and that the Winter and Zelicha-Hendel lists fell below the threshold; no seat figure for Likud appears in the material.
• No official turnout percentage is given, only descriptions of it as high.
• Official results had not been published at the time of these reports, and exit polls in past Israeli elections have at times shifted once the count was complete.