Bennett, Yossi Cohen vying to head Israel's right-wing after Netanyahu - poll

A political party led by former prime minister Naftali Bennett would receive nine seats, a party of IDF reservists led by former communications minister Yoaz Hendel and a party led by former Mossad chief Yossi Cohen would win five seats each, and a party led by Minister-without-portfolio Gideon Sa’ar would not pass the electoral threshold, if these parties ran independently in a national election, according to an exclusive poll by The Jerusalem Post.

Aiming to map out the divergence of voters in possible new parties in the next election, the poll also found that in this scenario, the centrist Yesh Atid Party would only win nine seats, and a party led by former deputy IDF chief of staff and deputy economy minister Yair Golan that would represent a merger of the left-wing Labor and Meretz parties, would win seven seats.

In this scenario, the full results would be National Unity 28; the Likud 16; Shas 10; nine each for Yesh Atid, Bennett nine and Otzma Yehudit; Golan Meretz-Labor party seven; six each for United Torah Judaism (UTJ) and Yisrael Beytenu; and five each for Hendel, Cohen, Hadash-Ta’al, and Ra’am.

Not including Bennett, Hendel, and Cohen, this shows that the current coalition would receive 41 seats and the current opposition would receive 60, including the two Arab-Israeli parties.

The Religious Zionist Party (RZP) led by Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich would receive just 2.9% of the vote and not pass the electoral threshold of 3.25%, nor would the Arab-Israeli party Balad (1.8%) nor a party led by Sa’ar (1.8%).

Conservative Israel politics put in spotlight

The poll also examined a more conservative scenario, whereby the current parties run again without changes, save for the Labor party being led by Golan instead of current chairwoman Merav Michaeli.

In this case, National Unity would win 41 seats; the Likud 18; Yesh Atid 10; Shas 10; Yisrael Beytenu nine; Otzma Yehudit nine; UTJ six; Hadash-Ta’al five; and RZP four, Labor under and Ra’am four each.

Thus, the current coalition would win 47 seats and the opposition 73 seats, including the two Arab parties. In this scenario, Meretz would fall below the electoral threshold (2.9%), as would Balad (1.8%).

The poll, conducted by Dr. Menachem Lazar, surveyed 515 Jewish and Arab respondents, and the margin of error is ±4.3%.