{"id":6958,"date":"2026-01-14T21:10:12","date_gmt":"2026-01-14T20:10:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/fokusisrael.ch\/?p=6958"},"modified":"2026-01-14T21:10:13","modified_gmt":"2026-01-14T20:10:13","slug":"israel-2026-another-deadlock-election","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fokusisrael.ch\/en\/news-en\/israel-2026-another-deadlock-election\/","title":{"rendered":"Israel 2026: Another Deadlock Election?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By Jan Kapusnak<\/em>\u00a0i<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Israel\u2019s next parliamentary election is set for 27 October 2026 – and if it happens on schedule, the Knesset will complete a full four-year term for the first time since 1992\u201396, after decades of early dissolutions and a political crisis of five elections in less than four years. But this durability is not stability; it is Benjamin \u201cBibi\u201d Netanyahu\u2019s political survival. Remaining in office helps him fight corruption charges and defer a full reckoning for October 7, 2023, Israel\u2019s gravest security failure, while sustaining a corrupt coalition kept together through sweeping concessions to far-right and ultra-Orthodox partners even as the country fights an existential war.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Public sentiment points the other way: polls show most Israelis would have preferred early elections, making October 2026 a delayed verdict on wartime leadership. It will again be \u201cBibi vs. anti-Bibi,\u201d but also a referendum on Israel\u2019s democracy – whether Netanyahu\u2019s bloc further weakens institutional checks and balances, and whether the state authorizes a serious independent inquiry into the failures of October 7.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the center of the pro-Bibi camp stands Netanyahu\u2019s Likud<\/strong>, a right-wing nationalist-conservative party. Even after years of failed Gaza policy – built on the assumption that Hamas could be \u201cmanaged\u201d through deterrence and Qatari cash – culminating in the October 7 massacre, Netanyahu still presents Likud and himself as Israel\u2019s only credible security guarantor, while claiming credit for weakening Iran and its regional axis, including Hamas in Gaza. Economically, Likud favors the free market with targeted social support. Institutionally, Likud has radically shifted from a liberal tradition of defending judicial independence to a populist, leader-centric posture – attacking \u201celites\u201d in the media, the military and security services, and the courts, and invoking a hostile \u201cdeep state\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Despite personal rivalries, Netanyahu\u2019s key allies remain two far-right parties: Religious Zionism <\/strong>(Bezalel Smotrich) and Otzma Yehudit<\/strong> (Itamar Ben-Gvir). Both push settlement expansion, Israeli sovereignty in the West Bank and Gaza, weaker judicial constraints, tighter political control over the police, and a tougher line toward Arabs and anything they label as the \u201cleft.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The bloc is completed by the ultra-Orthodox parties Shas<\/strong> (Aryeh Deri) and United Torah Judaism<\/strong> (Yitzhak Goldknopf, Moshe Gafni), focused on preserving the religion\u2013state \u201cstatus quo\u201d (legal rabbinical control over marriage\/divorce, conversion and Jewish status), securing budgets, and maintaining draft exemptions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The anti-Netanyahu bloc is broad but chronically fragmented, spanning the secular right to the liberal center-left. Its former flagship, Benny Gantz\u2019s Blue and White<\/strong>, was built on his ex\u2013IDF chief of staff credentials and a promise of responsible governance, but his decision to join Netanyahu in 2020 and again after October 7 blurred the line between opposition and coalition, eroding his credibility as an alternative. The party was further weakened when senior figures, including ex\u2013IDF chief Gadi Eisenkot, left; Eisenkot went on to launch Yashar<\/strong>, a centrist \u201crepair and healing\u201d list aimed at rebuilding public trust and offering a governing alternative.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The bloc\u2019s secular-center anchor is Yair Lapid\u2019s Yesh Atid<\/strong>, which campaigns on civil equality, limiting religious imposition, defending a free press, and protecting democratic checks and balances. Lapid has also been Netanyahu\u2019s most consistent parliamentary antagonist, positioning himself as the clearest institutional alternative to the ruling camp. To Lapid\u2019s right sits Avigdor Lieberman\u2019s Yisrael Beiteinu<\/strong>, hawkish on security but defined domestically by its fight against ultra-Orthodox exemptions and rabbinical power, insisting on an \u201cequal burden\u201d – above all universal conscription and workforce participation. On the left, Yair Golan\u2019s Democrats <\/strong>frame the election as a last-ditch struggle for liberal democracy and minority rights<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hovering over the entire opposition map is the return of Naftali Bennett.<\/strong> Long identified with the pro-Netanyahu right, Bennett broke ranks in 2021 to join the \u201cchange\u201d coalition and became prime minister despite commanding only a small Knesset faction, with Yair Lapid as alternate prime minister under their rotation agreement. That government also made history by relying on Ra\u2019am, an Arab Islamist party, as a coalition partner – an unprecedented step in Israeli politics. The experiment ultimately collapsed in 2022. Bennett\u2019s comeback now reshapes the opposition landscape by offering a security-minded, managerial alternative for voters exhausted by Netanyahu yet unconvinced by the old anti-Netanyahu leadership.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Israel\u2019s parliamentary system, no one becomes prime minister by winning the most votes. Power goes to whoever can stitch together a coalition commanding at least 61 of the Knesset\u2019s 120 seats.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

January 2026 polling<\/strong> points to a familiar destination: deadlock. Likud remains the largest party at roughly 25 seats, yet the pro-Netanyahu bloc totals only 50\u201352; the anti-Netanyahu bloc edges ahead on paper at around 56\u201358 – still short of 61 and with virtually no prospect of cross-bloc defections, as political dogmatism has locked parties into two mutually hostile camps and electoral bargaining\/shifts now happens mostly within blocs, not between them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That is why the race has narrowed to three plausible prime ministers – Netanyahu, Lapid, and Bennett – and why a stalemate could again leave Netanyahu<\/strong> in office even after the elections, heading an interim government through successive rounds of voting until one side finds a way to break through.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lapid<\/strong> remains the opposition\u2019s most consistent institutional challenger, but the real surprise is Bennett<\/strong>\u2019s comeback: his new list (Bennett 2026) polls around 21 seats, making him the strongest opposition force and the election\u2019s key wildcard. But a chunk of that support may be \u201cparking\u201d by undecided voters rather than a stable bloc – meaning those numbers could shrink as October approaches. Crucially, Bennett\u2019s path to actually becoming prime minister is constrained by coalition arithmetic: a Bennett-led government is feasible with some form of Arab-party<\/strong> partnership – either Arab parties inside the coalition or external support.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Despite having governed with Ra\u2019am last time, Bennett now says he will not govern with Arab backing, and key partners draw similar red lines – Lieberman, for instance, rejects cooperation with \u201cnon-Zionist\u201d Arab parties. Even if figures such as Eisenkot and Golan are more open in principle, that is still not enough to produce a workable majority, so Bennett\u2019s path to the premiership runs into a wall. After October 7, much of the Jewish public has hardened against formal reliance on Arab parties, leaving them potentially numerically pivotal yet politically toxic – and leaving the country trapped, once again, in a stalemate that rewards the incumbent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Beyond personalities and blocs, the vote will hinge on several core topics<\/strong>: security and accountability (the future of Gaza and whether to launch a serious, independent October 7 probe); democracy and corruption (the coalition\u2019s drive to curb the Supreme Court and weaken oversight versus an opposition pledging to defend judicial checks and a free press); burden-sharing (end Haredi draft exemptions); and economic recovery (a rising cost of living, rebuilding southern and northern Israel, and budgets strained by prolonged war).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In foreign policy,<\/strong> a change of government would likely bring more change in style than in strategy. On core security files – Hamas, Iran, Hezbollah, and the U.S. alliance – there is broad continuity across most Zionist parties. The main shifts would likely appear in two areas: West Bank policy, with fewer annexationist signals and a slower settlement push if Smotrich and Ben-Gvir lose leverage; and regional diplomacy, with more pragmatic engagement with Arab partners, Washington, and Europe – especially on shaping Gaza\u2019s \u201cday after.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

Jan Kapusniak is an author and political analyst who lives in Tel Aviv and writes about Israel and the Middle East<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Jan Kapusnak\u00a0i Israel\u2019s next parliamentary election is set for 27 October 2026 – and if it happens on schedule, the Knesset will complete a full four-year term for the first time since 1992\u201396, after decades of early dissolutions and a political crisis of five elections in less than four years. But this durability is […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":6965,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_hide_socialbar":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[823],"tags":[2159,2000,654,920,2160,2158,959],"class_list":["post-6958","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-en","tag-bennett","tag-elections","tag-israel-en","tag-israel-elections-2026","tag-jan-kapusniak","tag-lapid","tag-netanyahu-en"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t