New Israel election poll places Yair Lapid ahead of Netanyahu

A new poll of Israeli voters’ intentions has shown that if elections were held today, Yair Lapid’s Yesh Atid faction would come out on top, ahead of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud.

The poll, published by the Hebrew daily Maariv this morning shows Yesh Atid winning 27 Knesset seats, up 16 from the 11 the party won in the 2015 election.

Likud would drop eight seats, from 30 to 22.

In third place came the Labor-dominated Zionist Camp, with 14 seats, a sharp drop from the 24 the list picked up in 2015.

Current coalition member Jewish Home, meanwhile, would rise from eight seats to 13, while the Joint List would fall from 13 to 11.

Finance Minister Moshe Kahlon’s Kulanu party, which won ten seats in 2015, would lose a single seat, falling to nine, while Defence Minister Avigdor Lieberman’s Yisrael Beitenu party got five seats in the poll, down from the six it won in 2015.

The United Torah Judaism party was up two seats in the poll, rising from six to eight, while Shas barely crossed the 3.25 per cent minimum electoral threshold with four seats. Meretz, meanwhile, rose from five seats to seven.

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