Netanyahu's Likud drops in polls, one week after Gaza operation

Benny Gantz’s National Unity Party would receive 28 seats, compared with 27 last week and 31 two weeks ago.

 PM BENJAMIN NETANYAHU speaks at a Jerusalem conference on Jabotinsky. Notes a protester: ‘I'm from a revisionist family. What’s happening today in the Knesset goes against what the Likud used to be.’  (photo credit: MARC ISRAEL SELLEM)
PM BENJAMIN NETANYAHU speaks at a Jerusalem conference on Jabotinsky. Notes a protester: ‘I'm from a revisionist family. What’s happening today in the Knesset goes against what the Likud used to be.’
(photo credit: MARC ISRAEL SELLEM)

If elections were held today, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud Party would receive 25 seats, down three seats from a similar poll held last week after Operation Shield and Arrow, according to a new poll by Dr. Menachem Lazar’s Panels Politics.

The 25 seats are identical to what the Likud received two weeks ago, prior to the operation.

Benny Gantz’s National Unity Party would receive 28 seats, compared with 27 last week and 31 two weeks ago.

Asked who was more suited to serve as prime minister, 42% of the respondents said Gantz, and 38% said Netanyahu.

Seventy-two percent of the respondents who voted for the coalition parties said Netanyahu, and 13% said Gantz.

 National Unity Party head Benny Gantz at a faction meeting on May 1, 2023. (credit: MARC ISRAEL SELLEM/THE JERUSALEM POST)
National Unity Party head Benny Gantz at a faction meeting on May 1, 2023. (credit: MARC ISRAEL SELLEM/THE JERUSALEM POST)

Eighty-five percent of the respondents who voted for the opposition parties said Gantz, and 4% said Netanyahu.

How did the other parties do in the poll?

Other parties that would receive mandates, according to the poll, were Yesh Atid (16), Shas (nine), United Torah Judaism (eight), Religious Zionist Party (seven), Yisrael Beytenu and Hadash-Ta’al (six each) and Meretz, Otzma Yehudit and Ra’am (five each).

Parties that received less than the 3.25% electoral threshold were Labor, with 2% of the vote, down from 2.9% two weeks ago, and Balad, with 1.8%.

The poll was held May 17-18. It included 513 participants, and its margin of error was 4.3%.