The Jewish Home party led by Interior Minister Ayelet Shaked is closing in on the minimum threshold for entry into the Knesset, a new poll shows, and may hold the key for the right-wing returning to power.
The poll, conducted by Panels Politics and published by Ma’ariv Friday morning, found that if new elections were held today, neither the Netanyahu bloc nor the current government coalition have a majority.
The Likud and its allies – Shas, United Torah Judaism, the Religious Zionist Party, and the Jewish Home – are projected to win 60 seats, one short of an outright majority in the 120-member Knesset.
The current coalition government’s constituent parties would win 56 seats, while the four remaining mandates would go to the Hadash-Ta’al party, a joint list of two Arab factions.
The Likud is poised to win 32 seats, the poll found, two more than it currently has and the same number predicted in the previous Panels Politics poll, released two days ago.
Yesh Atid fell from 25 seats to 24, while the Religious Zionist Party alliance with Otzma Yehudit and Noam held steady at 13 seats.
The National Unity list received 12 seats, the same as in the previous poll, while Shas and United Torah Judaism received eight and seven seats respectively.
Yisrael Beytenu again polled at six seats, while Labor rose from four seats to five. Meretz held steady at five seats.
The United Arab List and Hadash-Ta’al received four seats apiece. The Arab nationalist Balad faction received just 1.1% of the vote, far below the 3.25% electoral threshold.
The Jewish Home inched closer towards the threshold, rising from 2.4% to 2.7%.
Friday’s poll also offered respondents a scenario in which Opposition Leader Benjamin Netanyahu offers his support to Shaked and her Jewish Home party.
In this scenario, the Jewish Home party narrowly crosses the electoral threshold with four seats, ending the deadlock and giving the Netanyahu bloc a majority in the Knesset with 62 seats, compared to 54 for the current coalition.
The four seats going to the Jewish Home would come at the expense of the Likud, Yesh Atid, the Religious Zionist Party, and the National Unity list, each of which would receive one less seat than they otherwise would have.