The United Right Party, whose members are Avigdor Liberman, Naftali Bennett, Yossi Cohen, Ayelet Shaked and Gideon Sa’ar, is expected to receive 27 seats in the Knesset elections and be the largest party.
This is according to the latest Maariv survey conducted by Lazar Research, headed by Dr. Menachem Lazar and in collaboration with Panel4All.
Moreover, Bennett even leads over all the candidates in the suitability for the Premiership.
With a united right party?
According to the survey, the main damage is to the National Unity party, which is expected to lose seven mandates and drop to 17. Likud (19) and Yesh Atid (13) lose two mandates each, while Otzma Yehudit (8) and the Labor Party (5) each lose a mandate.
The summary shows the situation facing a united right-wing party – the opposition gains three seats at the expense of the current coalition, and the balance between the blocs stands at 44 seats (for the coalition) against 76 (for the opposition, including Hadash Ta’al and Ra’am).
Two mandates come from New Hope voters, led by Gideon Sa’ar, whose vote base goes down the drain in the current situation of an independent contest.
The Maariv survey also shows that despite the continuation of the war of attrition in the North, the IDF’s operation in the Gaza Strip, the deadlock in the negotiations on the hostages, and the High Court’s ruling on the issue of recruiting ultra-Orthodox to the IDF, there were no significant changes in the mandate map in the existing parties this week.
This week, the suitability results for prime minister are almost unchanged—Benny Gantz received 44% support compared to 38% support for Benjamin Netanyahu, while another 18% do not know.
Without a united right party?
In the confrontation between Liberman and Netanyahu, the latter prevails with 39% against 34% for the former. Another 27% do not know.
On the other hand, Naftali Bennett fared much better against Netanyahu—Bennett got 48% against 36% for Netanyahu.
The Maariv survey also shows that about half of the respondents (47%) support another attempt to reach a settlement on the haredi recruitment issue despite (and perhaps because of) the High Court ruling this week. 35% oppose it, and 18% have no opinion.
The New Hope party led by Gideon Sa’ar (1.8%), the Religious Zionist Party led by Bezalel Smotrich (2.4%), and Balad (1.7%) would not pass the threshold.
The poll also asked respondents, “If in the next Knesset elections, a united right-wing party, whose members are Avigdor Liberman, Naftali Bennett, Yossi Cohen, Ayelet Shaked, and Gideon Sa’ar, and the other parties remain unchanged, who would you vote for?”
The answers were: the United Right Party had 27 seats, the Likud 19, the National Unity Party 17, Yesh Atid 13, Shas 10, Otzma Yehudit 8, United Torah Judaism 7, Labour 5, Hadash-Ta’al 5, Raam 5, Meretz 4.