Poll Shows Likud Falls to 22 Seats as Opposition Leaders Gain

A new Maariv poll conducted by Lazar Research shows Likud dropping by three seats this week to 22, its weakest result since August 2025, when the party got 21 seats in a Maariv survey. The decline comes against the backdrop of the brief confrontation with Iran, which ended, according to the article, with President Donald Trump effectively tying Israel’s hands, and after Trump said he was not sure that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu would run in the next election, alongside the coalition’s accelerated legislative push.

Despite Likud’s slide, the governing bloc held steady at 50 seats after the Religious Zionism party again cleared the electoral threshold. The Zionist opposition bloc remained at 60 seats, and Arab parties won another 10 seats. The contest for the largest party has tightened into a three-way race between Likud, Naftali Bennett’s Yachad, and Gadi Eisenkot’s Yashar!.

In the poll’s vote question, Likud received 22 seats, Yachad 21, Yashar! 20, The Democrats 10, Yisrael Beytenu 9, Otzma Yehudit 9, Shas 8, United Torah Judaism 7, Hadash-Ta’al 6, Ra’am 4, and Religious Zionism 4. Blue and White, Balad, and the Reservists did not pass the threshold.

For the premiership question, Bennett led Netanyahu 43% to 39%, while Eisenkot widened his lead to 44% against 40% for Netanyahu. Netanyahu led Avigdor Lieberman 41% to 37%, though that gap narrowed sharply from the previous poll, when Netanyahu led 48% to 29%. Separately, 50% of Israelis said they believe Trump will act in Israel’s interest in a confrontation with Iran, 43% said they trust him little or not at all, and 7% said they do not know.