Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is heading toward a closely contested national election on October 27, confronting an opposition bloc unified primarily by its resistance to his decades-long dominance of the country's politics.
Netanyahu, who is also wanted by the International Criminal Court on war crimes charges related to Gaza, enters the vote with diminished domestic standing. Recent opinion surveys project his Likud party will secure between 20 and 22 seats, down from the 32 it won in the 2022 election, with former supporters moving toward rival opposition factions and harder-line right-wing groups.
While Likud and its governing partners remain tied in polls with an alliance of opposing right-wing and militaristic parties, the anti-Netanyahu bloc has not yet chosen an official leader. Former army chief Gadi Eisenkot is widely regarded as its most likely candidate for prime minister. “He’s essentially running unopposed. It’s Netanyahu versus a coalition of opponents,” said Mitchell Barak, a former aide to Netanyahu.
Netanyahu's current administration, the most far-right in Israel's history, incorporates figures such as Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, who was previously convicted of incitement to racism and supporting a terrorist group. Aida Touma-Sliman, an outgoing member of the Knesset from the Hadash party, noted that Netanyahu “knows exactly what he’s doing when he includes people like Smotrich and Ben-Gvir in his government, and he knows the outcome of those appointments.”
The political campaign unfolds against the backdrop of ongoing conflict and escalating unrest in the occupied West Bank. According to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, settler attacks rose from 1,291 in 2023 to 1,835 in 2025. The agency reported that Israeli forces and settlers have killed at least 1,071 Palestinians in the territory, including 233 children, since October 7, 2023.
Netanyahu, who previously served as prime minister from 1996 to 1999 and from 2009 to 2021 before returning to office in 2022, also remains embroiled in corruption proceedings that began in 2019. In early 2023, his coalition's controversial attempt to overhaul the judicial system triggered massive street protests across the country, further polarizing the electorate ahead of the upcoming ballot.
