Netanyahu and Eisenkot Both Claim Momentum as Israeli Election Result Remains Unsettled

Shortly after 3:15 on Wednesday morning, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu walked onto a stage in a Jerusalem conference hall, looking, by one account, reinvigorated and ebullient. Hours earlier and across the country, his chief rival, Gadi Eisenkot, had taken his own stage like a winner. Neither man had won anything yet. Israelis had voted in the largest numbers in a generation, and the exit polls left the country without an answer.

The three largest Israeli television networks first projected a small lead for Eisenkot's anti-Netanyahu alliance. Updated versions then shifted: one now put Netanyahu and his allies narrowly ahead, while the other two showed the blocs even. Exit polls in Israel have a spotty record, especially in close races. The official count was far behind, with nearly a million votes tallied, about a fifth of those cast, and counting expected to take days.

Eisenkot, a former military chief whose son was killed in the Gaza war, embraced members of his Yashar party and waved to flag-waving supporters who hailed him as the next prime minister. "We've made history," he said, calling the election a referendum on who should lead Israel. "Tonight we got the answer. The public wants change." He also addressed the country's security chiefs and public servants, saying Netanyahu now heads a transitional government that has lost public confidence. "Stand strong and firm against any attempt to challenge you," he told them. Citing reports that Netanyahu has pushed for renewed attacks on Iran, he warned: "Netanyahu, don't dare use Israel's security for your political needs."

Netanyahu acknowledged that the exit polls were only a preview and that he was awaiting official results, but he sounded triumphant. He said Likud had clearly emerged as the largest party and mocked months of polls that had shown it trailing Eisenkot's. He listed Israel's enemies who have been killed, including Iran's Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and said, "Iran is weaker than ever, Israel is stronger than ever," adding that with his "friend" President Trump the Iranian threat could be removed for good. "We must form a strong right-wing government," he said, offering the opposition no outstretched hand. At Likud headquarters, activists in "Make Israel Great Again" caps threw voting slips like confetti, though some party officials privately conceded the path to a coalition is narrow.

The arithmetic is the problem. If the exit polls hold, neither bloc can govern without two Arab parties, projected to win as many as 17 or 18 of the 120 seats, their strongest showing ever. They are the socially conservative United Arab List, known as Raam, and the left-wing Joint List. Netanyahu has effectively ruled out including them, and Eisenkot's partners have balked too. Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said parties that cannot condemn the Oct. 7 massacre or declare Hamas a terrorist organization are "not legitimate actors in Israeli politics."

Mansour Abbas, Raam's leader, said record Arab turnout turned "frustration and despair" into "hope," and that his first priority was ensuring a chance to form a government that replaces Netanyahu's. Arab citizens are about 20 percent of the population, and many said they were furious over Netanyahu's treatment of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza and policies they see as second-class treatment at home. Raam joined a coalition once, in 2021, under Naftali Bennett. That government lasted roughly a year, and its collapse sent angry right-wing voters to Netanyahu, who then built the most hard-line government in Israel's history. Bennett, who now leads a party in the opposition alliance, declared that "the government of Oct. 7 will go home," and pledged to pursue conscription of ultra-Orthodox Jews, without saying whether Likud or Arab parties could be partners.

A unity government is one option analysts are weighing, but it faces steep obstacles. Eisenkot's voters despise Netanyahu, the two would have to settle who serves as prime minister, Netanyahu is unlikely to yield control, and Eisenkot has called him unfit to lead. Eisenkot has also floated a minority government.

Next come the official totals and the allocation of seats. Then President Isaac Herzog will invite the leader he believes best placed to assemble a coalition, usually needing 61 lawmakers. Still uncounted are hundreds of thousands of ballots from military bases, hospitals, prisons and embassies, which favored Netanyahu's side in the last election.