Israel's Labor largely unaffected after Michaeli's resignation, election poll shows

Labor leader Merav Michaeli's announcement last week that she was stepping down did not greatly affect the state of polls as National Unity continues with a massive lead, according to a poll published by Maariv on Friday.

Benny Gantz's National Unity party would win the election if held today with more than double the mandates than the Likud under Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's leadership.

At the bottom of the list would be Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich's Religious Zionist Party with the least mandates at four.

Next, would be MK Mansour Abbas's Ra'am, MK Aimen Odeh's and MK Ahmad Tibi's Hadash-Ta'al, and Meretz under Zehava Galon's leadership with five mandates each.

National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir's Otzma Yehudit and United Torah Judaism would come next with seven mandates, with Israel's other ultra-Orthodox party Shas, following with eight mandates.

MK Avigdor Liberman's Yisrael Beytenu would be next with nine mandates, followed by opposition leader Yair Lapid's Yesh Atid at 14.

The Likud would lead the opposition with 17 seats

While the votes for Labor have almost doubled since last week, they would still not get enough to cross the threshold.

The current coalition would win 43 mandates, and a coalition consisting of the rest of the parties except Hadash-Ta'al would have a total of 72 seats.

Meanwhile, more than half of respondents said that Gantz is more suited to be prime minister than Netanyahu, while only 31% said the opposite.