The average of the three latest polls taken since Ehud Barak announced the setting up of his independent party and the election of Amir Peretz and Nitzan Horowitz to lead the Labor and Meretz parties respectively, find that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu would struggle to form the next government.
The average of two polls by Channel 13 and one by Channel 12 found that Netanyahu's Likud is projected to win 32 seats in the September 17 Knesset elections and Benny Gantz's Blue & White 31 seats.
The Joint Arab List would win 11 seats, and Avigdor Liberman's Israel Beitenu 8 seats. Shas and the Labor party are each projected to win 7 seats, a strengthening for the latter since Amir Peretz was elected leader. United Torah Judaism would win six seats, the New Right and Meretz five seats each and Ehud Barak and the Right Wing Union both sit precariously on the minimum threshold of four seats each.
So if Netanyahu were able to convince the now strengthened Liberman to sit together with the religious parties, which he was unable to do after the April 9 elections, he would have a narrow 62 seat majority in the 120-seat Knesset. Alternatively, Labor, under Amir Peretz, and Ehud Barak could also be persuaded to join Netanyahu but might be deterred by the potential indictment of the prime minister, rather than by his ideological position.
Published by Globes, Israel business news - en.globes.co.il - on July 4, 2019
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