On December 31 of each year, Israel’s Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS) publishes, inter alia, demographic statistics of the outgoing year. These days, those who look at last year’s statistics with the greatest concern are the center and left-wing parties.
In the past, these concerns were based primarily on the birth rates within Israel’s Jewish religious population (ultra-Orthodox and National Religious), and the Arab population (especially the Bedouins within it), which are much higher than those in the non-religious, liberal population.
This year, special attention has been directed to the migration figures – especially those of emigration.
The figures show that the number of Israelis who left Israel for in excess of nine months in the years 2023-2025 is around 211,000. It is generally assumed that an overwhelming majority of those have higher education and had traditionally voted for center or Left parties – though there are no available statistics as to how many of them are too young to vote.
Reasons for leaving
The reasons for this rather massive outflow appear to include displeasure with the government’s judicial reform – constitutional upheaval – plans; the prolongation of the war in Gaza, and some of the twists and turns it has taken; the deterioration of the economic situation; and the government’s refusal to take direct responsibility for the events of October 7, 2023, and its attitude towards the hostages and their families, the bereaved families, and the domestic refugees.
What is also not absolutely clear is how many Israelis returned to Israel in these years. The number is assumed to be around 71,000, so that the net number of Israelis who left is around 140,000. That amounts to approximately three Knesset seats-worth total, and around two seats-worth if one doesn’t count the (estimated number of ) under 18-year-olds – all assumed to be center/Left seats.
All the opinion polls, except for those prepared for Channel 14, show the Center/Left receiving fewer than 60 Knesset seats if elections were held today, which is significantly higher than those predicted for today’s coalition members, but not enough to form an alternative government. The theoretical loss of two seats due to emigration is therefore significant.
To the best of my recollection, it was MK Yossi Sarid (until 1984 Labor, and thereafter Ratz and later Meretz) who first noted that the size of the center/Left bloc in the electorate was bound to decline in the future for demographic reasons.
Unplanned arrival
All this was before the unplanned arrival in Israel in the years 1990-2000 of over one million immigrants from the former Soviet Union, who generally held right-wing political leanings, resulting from their experience under the Communist regime of the Soviet Union.
What were the options left to the dwindling center-Left bloc’s prospects? The first was to try to change its condescending approach toward the religious voters, the Likud’s predominantly Mizrahi base, and large sections among the voters of Russian origin, and try to find the key to convincing them that its liberal or social democratic approach would not only be acceptable but also workable for them
The second was to break away from the taboo of forming governments that included Arabs. The third was to try to reestablish stable coalitions with the National Religious camp and/or with part or all of the haredi (ultra-Orthodox) parties. The fourth was to encourage collaboration with moderate, liberal right-wing parties – such as the Likud used to be before it shed all vestiges of liberalism. While the first option was never seriously tried, the second to fourth options were actually tried out, to a greater or lesser extent.
Labor-Shas coalition
Labor’s governments of 1992-1996, led by Yitzhak Rabin – and after his assassination by Shimon Peres – were based at first on a coalition with Shas, and then, after Shas left the government, against the background of the Oslo Accords signed on September 13, 1993, on agreements with several Arab parties. The Arab parties did not join the coalition, but agreed to support the government from the outside, in return for significant benefits to the Arab population in Israel.
The “government of change” of 2021-2022, led by Naftali Bennett (Yamina) and Yair Lapid (Yesh Atid), was based on a coalition between the center-Left and two liberal right-wing parties – Bennett’s Yamina, and Avigdor Lieberman’s Yisrael Beiteinu. In addition, one Arab party – Mansour Abbas’s Ra’am – joined the coalition, receiving several Knesset positions, but was not part of the government, and did not receive any ministerial appointments.
As mentioned, the migration figures are drawing attention these days, specifically for 2023-2025, during which Netanyahu’s extreme Right religious government has served. While the figures’ possible effect on the next general elections, to be held by October 2026, have made headlines, the fact that for the first time since the establishment of the state in 1948, the annual growth of Israel’s population in both 2024 and 2025 was a mere 1.1% – largely due to emigration, is cause for some concern.
But back to the possible next election results.
Small parties are a danger
As in the 2022 elections to the 25th Knesset, also in the elections to the 26th Knesset, it is not just the number of potential voters each political bloc can garner that matters. No less important is how each bloc can avoid losing votes because of small parties within each of them that are in danger of failing to pass the 3.25% qualifying threshold.
In the case of the religious-right-wing bloc, in the polls, Bezalel Smotrich’s Religious Zionist Party is wavering around the qualifying threshold. There is no doubt that, as he did toward the 2022 elections, Netanyahu will once again do his utmost to get Itamar Ben-Gvir’s Otzma Yehudit and the Religious Zionist Party to run in a single list.
In the 2022 elections, the Center-Left did not act as effectively as Netanyahu did within his camp, and failed to convince Merav Michaeli’s Labor Party to run in a single list with Zehava Galon’s Meretz.
In the final reckoning, Meretz failed to pass the qualifying threshold, and the Center-Left bloc lost some seats. In the next elections, Labor and Meretz will be running together within Yair Golan’s Democrats party. The potential problems lie with Benny Gantz’s Blue-White Party and Yo’az Hendel’s Reservists’ Party, both of which are in danger of failing to pass the qualifying threshold. Will the Center-Left parties act more decisively than they did last time, to avoid a critical loss of five to six Knesset seats, by convincing Gantz and Hendel to leave the race, run together, or (preferably) join other parties in the bloc?
The Center-Left bloc can do very little about the emigration figures, but it must deal with its potential vote losses.
The writer has written journalistic and academic articles, as well as several books, on international relations, Zionism, Israeli politics, and parliamentarism. In the years 1994-2010, she worked in the Knesset Library and the Knesset Research and Information Center.