Netanyahu’s bloc narrowly leads Israeli opposition with around 28% of votes counted - Anadolu Ajansı

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s bloc narrowly led the opposition bloc early Wednesday in parliamentary elections, securing 50.4% against 49.6% with around 28% of the votes counted, according to data published by the Yedioth Ahronoth daily.

Neither projection gave either bloc the 61 seats required for a parliamentary majority.

The newspaper also noted that Netanyahu’s Likud party led the results with 24.1% of the vote, followed by former Army Chief of Staff Gadi Eisenkot’s Yashar party with 16.1%.

The Together alliance led by former Prime Minister Naftali Bennett followed with 8.8%. Yisrael Beiteinu received 6.9%, United Torah Judaism 6.7% and Otzma Yehudit 6.4%. The Joint List received 5.9%, while Shas and the Democrats each secured 5.6%. Religious Zionism received 5.4%.

The United Arab List (Ra’am) received 2.8%, bringing the combined share of the two Arab lists, the Joint List and Ra’am, to 8.7% of counted votes.

The partial tally did not establish the final distribution of seats in the 120-member Knesset.

Turnout reached 77.7%, up 7.1 percentage points from the 2022 election and the highest since 1999, according to the Central Elections Committee.