Overview
- Exit polls released after polls closed on Tuesday showed Gadi Eisenkot’s opposition bloc narrowly ahead while Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud was the largest single party, yet neither camp reached the 61 seats needed to form a majority.
- Voter turnout was unusually high, with the Central Elections Committee reporting roughly 74.3 percent participation by 8 p.m., a surge that boosted smaller lists and complicated seat calculations.
- Arab-led parties are projected to win a record share of seats and could become kingmakers in coalition talks, though most Jewish-led opposition parties have not committed to a formal coalition with them.
- Roughly 600,000 double-envelope ballots, which include votes by IDF personnel and other special categories and are counted separately, plus outstanding complaints about ballot disruptions and a voter-bribery probe, mean final results can shift and are scheduled for official publication on November 4.
- The next phase is political bargaining: the president will consult party leaders and assign a candidate to try to build a coalition within weeks, leaving Israel under a caretaker government until a majority is assembled or new elections are called.