Israelis went to the polls on Tuesday in their first general election since Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack, in a knife-edge contest between veteran Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and centrist challenger Gadi Eisenkot. The Israel election Netanyahu is contesting is closely watched because voters are judging his leadership and the country’s rightward drift, according to Dawn.
The last published polls showed the two men running neck and neck, according to Dawn. Eisenkot, a former military chief and political novice, leads the Yashar party and an informal bloc spanning from the right to the centre-left, according to Euronews. He is 66, while Netanyahu is 77.
Some 7.3 million people are eligible to vote, including hundreds of thousands of first-time young voters, according to Euronews. The size of that group is one reason the outcome is difficult to predict, though the outline of the race does not say how these voters are expected to split.
Arab-majority parties representing around 21% of the population could become kingmakers if the result is as tight as expected, Euronews reported. Neither leading candidate has publicly said he would partner with them, leaving open how a governing majority could be formed.
No official or final results were available at the time of the sources. Final results could take days, and no party is expected to come close to the 61 seats needed for a majority in the 120-member Knesset, according to Euronews.
Eisenkot has pledged an independent state inquiry into the October 7 security failures, according to Euronews. That pledge places the attack at the centre of the campaign, and Axios framed the election as a referendum on Netanyahu’s leadership and his handling of those failures. Axios was available only as a headline and short excerpt, so its wider details are limited.
Netanyahu has served as prime minister on and off for more than 19 years. He campaigned on his security record and his close relationship with US President Donald Trump, according to the outline’s background reporting.
Netanyahu returned to power in December 2022 with far-right ultra-nationalists in his coalition. The opposition has criticised his backing of ultra-Orthodox parties seeking draft exemptions.
Several points remain unclear. The voter accounts and the Jerusalem and Kiryat Arba scenes come only from Dawn, and no independent confirmation of them is provided. Reports that tens of thousands of Israelis flew in from abroad to vote are estimates, not confirmed counts. Neither Netanyahu nor Eisenkot has said publicly whether he would partner with Arab-majority lists.
Coalition talks could last weeks or months after the vote, with possible new elections if negotiations fail.
Sources
This article was written with AI assistance from the published reporting listed above. It is part of the World Brief daily news podcast.