100 days into the administration of Binyamin Netanyahu, a poll shows Likud and the nationalist wing gaining popularity. According to a telephone poll carried out by Shvakim Panorama for Israel Television Channel One's Friday Night news magazine, the right wing bloc would grow from the current 65 seats to 71 while Kadima would lose five seats and Labor would lose three, if elections were held today.

These are the results that were received, current Knesset seats are in brackets:

29 [27] Likud
23 [28] Kadima
16 [15] Yisrael Beiteinu
12 [11] Shas
10 [13] Labor
06 [05] UTJ
05 [03] Meretz
11 [11] Arab parties
04 [04] Nat'l Union
04 [03] Jewish Home]

While the mainstream media has been almost unanimous in declaring Netanyahu a failure, most of the Israeli public appears to think otherwise. When asked if the following officials were doing a good job, this is the percentage of people who said “yes”:

57% Prime Minister Netanyahu
39% MK Tzipi Livni (as leader of the opposition)
68% Defense Minister Ehud Barak
49% Foreign Minster Avigdor Lieberman
40% Finance Minister Yuval Steinitz

When asked whom they would prefer to see as Prime Minister, 49 percent named Netanyahu and 32 percent chose Livni. 19 Percent said they do not know. Almost 30 percent of Kadima voters prefer Netanyahu over Livni as prime minister.

The poll was based on a representative sample of 516 adult Israelis, including Arabs with Israeli citizenship. Some 12 percent of those polled didn't say what party they would vote for.

"There's a gap between the media and the public,” said Channel One political reporter Ayala Hasson. “There is media discourse and it might still sink into the public but the media discourse is not correlated to public opinion," she added.