هذا التقرير متاح أيضًا بـ العربية
On 27 October 2026, Israelis will head to the polls for the first legislative election since 7 October 2023. It will also be the first election held on schedule since 1988, following five consecutive election rounds between 2019 and 2022. The Knesset has completed its full term for the first time in nearly four decades.
Israeli media have presented this election as a referendum on Benjamin Netanyahu’s wartime performance and a contest between the “coalition camp” and the “change camp”. But an examination of the competing parties’ platforms and their positions on the Palestinian issue reveals a different picture: the real competition is taking place within the same right-wing security framework, revolving around who manages the conflict and how it is managed. There is no central disagreement over the essence of Israeli control, nor any serious recognition of Palestinian national rights.
The establishment of a Palestinian state is no longer a leading plank in the platforms of any major Zionist list. Positions range from outright rejection to calls for “separation” or “shrinking the conflict”, and theoretical acceptance of a two-state solution that is postponed and kept off the front line of the election campaign. As this reality has become more entrenched, the focus of political competition has shifted to questions of governance, identity, the nature of the state, relations between branches of government and security competence following the failure of 7 October.
How are the lines of political division taking shape?
Since 1967, positions on the occupied territories and the Palestinians have become among the most important factors shaping political divisions in Israel, alongside differences over religion, the state and socioeconomic identity. In this context, researcher Micah Goodman offered an interpretation of the divide between right and left in his 2017 book “Catch-67”, based on their shared anxiety over the continuation of the conflict and their differing assessments of the greater danger it poses.
The Zionist left fears that the continuation of the occupation will entrench a state that rules over millions of Palestinians deprived of rights, threatening its Jewish and democratic character. The right, meanwhile, starts from a security rationale that sees withdrawal as potentially turning the West Bank into a rocket base close to Israeli cities. Each side sees the other’s solution as a path to catastrophe — what Goodman calls the “trap”.
From this diagnosis, Goodman developed his call to “shrink the conflict” rather than resolve it. His proposed approach involved measures to improve Palestinians’ lives and expand the scope of their self-administration, without establishing a state or requiring an Israeli withdrawal. Bennett later adopted this approach, illustrating the influence of Goodman’s theorising on right-wing discourse and the importance of his writings in explaining shifts within the Israeli political landscape.
This approach also reveals the common ground on which most Zionist camps operate. Their central question is: how does Israel protect itself from the Palestinians? Palestinian historical and political rights do not enter into the framing of the question in the first place. Some researchers trace the erosion of the left to the collapse of the Oslo project in Israeli public consciousness after the second intifada, and to the association in public discourse of any political settlement with naivety and security risks. The events of 7 October and the war on Gaza pushed this trend further.
On that basis, the positions of the different camps can be assessed along three interconnected axes:
- The position on a Palestinian state, ranging from outright rejection to theoretical acceptance deferred to an unspecified future.
- The position on the Palestinians, ranging from expulsion and annexation on the far right to separation and conflict management in the centre.
- The position on the nature of the state, including the judiciary, state institutions, the relationship between religion and the state, and the limits of Haredi influence.
The third axis has become the sharpest arena of internal polarisation as practical differences over the first two axes have narrowed.
The map of contenders: from right to far right
The contest involves more than 10 lists and parties. Polls published in July 2026 revealed two main surprises: the rise of Eisenkot to challenge Likud for first place, and Netanyahu’s decline to some of his lowest levels in more than a year. The following ranges are based on a series of polls published over the summer and therefore offer a snapshot of voter trends rather than a definitive forecast of the results.
Likud and Netanyahu: The party is polling at around 20 to 24 seats, a notable decline driven by Netanyahu’s criminal trial and the fallout from the failure of 7 October. Its discourse centres on rejecting a Palestinian state, maintaining security control and supporting settlement expansion. Netanyahu’s main strength lies in his ability to manage the far-right alliance under his leadership and make his personal survival a condition for the cohesion of the nationalist-religious camp, benefiting from the absence of an agreed alternative within his own camp.
“Yashar” and Eisenkot: The standout surprise, the party is polling at around 21 to 24 seats, competing with Likud for first place and surpassing it in several polls. Eisenkot is a former chief of staff and former member of the war cabinet formed after 7 October. He founded his party in 2025 and launched his campaign for prime minister in June 2026. In a poll by Maariv, he led Netanyahu in respondents’ preference for prime minister. Around 45 per cent of opposition voters chose him to lead their camp, compared with 25 per cent for Bennett.
He combines the role of the military theorist who formulated some of the most influential combat doctrines with that of the politician presenting himself as an alternative to Netanyahu, while preserving the same core security approach toward the Palestinians
📍What do you know about Israeli Gen. Gadi Eisenkot?https://t.co/Bi2K3jkYrR pic.twitter.com/q009i3XK1W
— NoonPost (@NoonPost) August 3, 2026
Eisenkot presents himself as a sober security alternative. His campaign avoids putting forward a clear political vision towards the Palestinians, beyond speaking of the “need for separation” and protection from the demographic threat. His appeal rests on his military background and disciplined image, enabling him to reach centre-right voters and right-wing voters dissatisfied with Netanyahu, while seeking to revive the historic image of generals leading Israel’s official establishment.
“Beyahad” — Bennett and Lapid: The list has fallen to around 13 to 17 seats after previously competing for first place following its merger in April. It brought together Bennett, the son of the settlement movement, and Lapid, one of the leading figures of the secular centre. Bennett leads the list, with Lapid in second place.
At the time of the merger, Bennett reiterated his refusal to give up “a single inch”, while Lapid had endorsed a two-state solution before the United Nations in 2022. The bloc’s platform avoids endorsing a two-state solution and focuses instead on removing Netanyahu and reforming institutions. For Yair Lapid, this reflects a willingness to make concessions on the Palestinian issue to unite part of the opposition.
“The Democrats” and Yair Golan: The party represents what remains of the Zionist left, polling at around 9 to 11 seats following the merger of Labor and Meretz. Golan is a reserve major general and former deputy chief of staff. His list, finalised through primaries in July, includes peace activists, Arab leaders and figures from the protest movement. Its campaign centres on democracy and clean government, and one of its most prominent promises is legislation barring criminal defendants from serving as prime minister.
Golan supports a two-state solution in principle and opposes settlement expansion, but he does not put this vision at the forefront of his campaign. Instead, he postpones it to an undefined future while simultaneously adopting hard-line security positions towards Gaza. This gap between the declared position and the hierarchy of electoral priorities is key to understanding the limits of Israel’s political landscape: even the force classified as “left-wing” hesitates to turn a Palestinian state into a near-term, implementable programme.
Yisrael Beiteinu and Lieberman: The party is polling at around 9 to 10 seats and remains in the opposition despite its hard-right roots. It is a hard-line secular nationalist party whose differences with Netanyahu centre on leadership, conscription and arrangements governing relations with the Haredim, without any fundamental disagreement over how to deal with the Palestinians. Its presence in the opposition shows that the label “change camp” does not necessarily mean it is less right-wing than the coalition.
Otzma Yehudit and Ben-Gvir: Representing the far right within the coalition, the party is polling at around 7 to 9 seats. Ben-Gvir advocates expelling Palestinians from Gaza, imposing full sovereignty over the West Bank, tightening the grip on Palestinians inside Israel, supporting settlement expansion and accelerating Judaization measures in Jerusalem. These positions place him at the far-right end of all three axes: land, the Palestinians and the nature of the state.
Religious Zionism and Smotrich: The party has fallen to around 4 to 5 seats and is now close to the electoral threshold, which it fell below in several polls after losing some of its voters to Bennett. It shares Ben-Gvir’s project of annexation and rejection of a Palestinian state, while adding a more explicit religious and organisational dimension. As finance minister and a partner in the Defence Ministry, Smotrich has worked to shift control over the West Bank from a military framework supposedly meant to be temporary towards civilian arrangements paving the way for annexation.
Shas and United Torah Judaism: The two Haredi parties retain around eight seats each and hold the balance of power. Their priorities centre on religion-and-state issues, funding for religious institutions and exemptions from military service for yeshiva students. The Palestinian issue does not feature as an independent priority in their platforms; their positions are generally shaped by alliance calculations involving Netanyahu’s camp and by religious and sectoral interests.
Arab lists: The Arab vote is divided between Hadash-Ta’al, polling at around 5 to 6 seats, and the United Arab List, or “Ra’am”, at around 4 to 5 seats. These are the only forces that place Palestinian rights and “equality” at the heart of their platforms, yet they continue to be treated as outside the equation of governance. They also differ over participation in a coalition led by Zionist parties. Ra’am regards participation or outside support as a possible means of advancing the demands of Palestinians inside Israel, while Hadash-Ta’al takes a more cautious position.
Declining forces and the electoral threshold: Alongside the main lists, several parties and political figures have lost ground or become dependent on merging with larger lists to improve their chances. These include Benny Gantz and Ayelet Shaked, smaller religious right-wing forces such as Noam, and Yuli Edelstein, who split from Likud. The electoral weakness of these blocs and figures does not mean they have no effect. Late withdrawals and alliances, as well as the transfer of votes between lists close to the threshold, could alter the distribution of seats within each camp and determine either side’s ability to approach a 61-seat majority.
Public opinion: the environment pushing parties to the right
This partisan shift is not happening in a vacuum. Opinion polls reflect a broader transformation within Israeli society. In a poll conducted by Israel’s Institute for National Security Studies in June 2026, 25 per cent of respondents supported a two-state solution, while 25 per cent supported full annexation without granting Palestinians civil rights. Another 27 per cent preferred “separation” from the Palestinians.
The differences between the camps reveal both the depth of the divide and its limits. Fifty per cent of coalition voters supported annexation without rights, while opposition voters were divided mainly between separation, at 40 per cent, and a two-state solution, at 36 per cent. This environment explains Eisenkot’s attachment to the term “separation”, Bennett’s insistence on his right-wing ceiling, and Golan’s decision to keep the two-state solution away from the centre of his campaign.
The results also show that support for a two-state solution has not completely disappeared among opposition voters, but it has become incapable of translating into a central electoral programme. This is the significance of the shift: the right does not need every voter to adopt the most extreme position to dominate the political arena. It is enough for advocating a Palestinian state to become electorally costly, prompting competing parties to adjust their positions in anticipation of the punishment voters might impose if they endorse it explicitly.
The right-wing programme as the organising principle of competition
The electoral movement of Zionist parties follows a general rule: moving closer to the right broadens their chances of competing, while moving away from it is seen as a risk. Yet the merger that created “Beyahad” did not give the opposition a major increase in its total number of seats. According to an analysis of Maariv data, most of the list’s seats came from voters who had already intended to vote for Bennett. This reflects the centre’s movement towards the right more than the right’s movement towards the centre.
Eisenkot’s rise reflects the same trajectory. He has attracted voters from the centre-right and from the right who are dissatisfied with Netanyahu, without putting forward a political alternative that goes beyond the broad outlines of the right. Lieberman, meanwhile, remains firmly right-wing within the opposition. The “change” camp therefore lacks a unified intellectual or political programme. Its members converge on removing Netanyahu and defending the institutions of the “state”, but they share no common vision for the future of the most sensitive issues, foremost among them how to deal with the Palestinians.
The biggest absentee: the two-state solution
Among the major Zionist forces, no list places the establishment of a Palestinian state at the forefront of its programme as a near-term political obligation. Golan’s party is the clearest test case: his list includes peace activists and Arab leaders, and he himself supports a two-state solution, yet his campaign revolves around democracy and clean government, leaving a political settlement in the background. Haaretz described this contradiction by saying that the largest “left-wing” party in Israel is unable to make the occupation a central issue in its electoral discourse.
The convergence of positions on a Palestinian state and the drift to the right do not mean the camps are identical. There is a real disagreement over judicial independence: Netanyahu’s camp seeks to subordinate the Supreme Court and reduce institutional checks, while the opposition’s campaign is built on defending them.
There are also disagreements over the religious character of the state, conscription, the limits of Haredi influence and the form of control over the land — between the formal, declared annexation advocated by Smotrich and Ben-Gvir, and the entrenchment of the status quo without a declaration in a broader political current.
These differences carry real weight in domestic politics and in the tools that will be used towards the Palestinians. But they operate within a shared framework that excludes a Palestinian state from the near-term implementation agenda and rejects treating the Palestinians as equal partners with an inherent right to the land and to self-determination.
The majority dilemma and the unlikely decisive role of Arab lists
The latest polls show that Netanyahu’s camp cannot secure a 61-seat majority on its own, while the Zionist opposition faces the same shortfall without the Arab lists. These calculations reveal a structural paradox within the “change camp”: the stronger its chances of removing Netanyahu, the more it needs the votes of forces that most of its leaders refuse to recognise as legitimate partners in government.
The dilemma is not merely numerical. It reveals Palestinians’ ability to participate in elections and hold a bloc that could decide the majority, while being stripped of the legitimacy to turn that weight into actual participation in decision-making. Even Ra’am’s experience of supporting the Bennett-Lapid government remains an exception that most opposition leaders avoid clearly committing to repeat.
This contradiction gives Netanyahu an important political card even as his camp’s numbers decline. He can portray any government dependent on the Arab lists as lacking legitimacy and push his rivals to rule out an alliance with them in advance. This behaviour amounts to pre-emptive intimidation of the opposition’s most reliable route to removing him from the scene, turning this deterrent into a practical obstacle to forming a new governing coalition.
The outcome could be another election round, or a broad coalition among rival Zionist forces that would allow Netanyahu to reproduce himself as caretaker prime minister or as head of an expanded unity government.