A poll conducted by Midgam, headed by Meno Geva, that was released by Channel 12 News last night, shows that Israel's political map has changed dramatically in the shadow of the rise in the rate of infection with the coronavirus in Israel and the government-imposed lockdown. The Likud party, headed by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, has declined to just 26 out of the 120 Knesset seats, while Yamina, headed by Naftali Bennett, has jumped to 23 seats.
Yesh Atid-Telem, headed by Yair Lapid, has risen slightly, to eighteen seats, followed by the Joint Arab List with fifteen seats, and Benny Gantz's Blue & White with just nine seats, the same as Shas. Yisrael Beitenu is back in public recognition with eight seats, United Torah Judaism is given seven seats, and Meretz is bottom with only five seats.
According to the Midgam poll, if Knesset elections were held today, the Labor Party would not pass the minimum vote threshold to win any seats at all, and the same fate would befall Rafi Peretz's Habayit Hayehudi (Jewish Home) party, Orly Levy-Abekasis's Gesher, and Derekh Eretz, the party of Yoaz Hendel and Zvi Hauser, who split from Blue & White.
The division between broader groupings that emerges from the poll is 49 for the right-wing parties, sixteen for the ultra-Orthodox parties (giving the two groups combined as a right-wing block a Knesset majority with 65 seats), 32 seats for the center-left Zionist parties, and, as mentioned, fifteen for the Arab list.
Published by Globes, Israel business news - en.globes.co.il - on October 7, 2020
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