Most Israeli voters wish to see an end to the historic alliance with the haredi (ultra-Orthodox Jewish) parties. A survey by the Rafi Smith institute for "Globes" and 'The Jerusalem Post" shows that only 15% of the public would like to see the Shas party in the next government. Only 5% said that they would like to see United Torah Judaism as part of the next coalition; 40% would prefer Netanyahu, assuming that he remains prime minister, form a coalition with Habayit Hayehudi, led by Naftali Bennett.
It seems likely that Netanyahu will be able to form a coalition without the haredim, but after he has already demonstrated that the alliance with his natural partners is more precious too him than equal sharing of the civic burden, it is by no means clear that he will be attentive to the public's wish. What does seem certain at present is that, even before the polling stations open, Netanyahu will indeed be the one forming a government after the election.
Looking leftwards to see which party the public wants to see in Netanyahu's government, it appears that Hatenua chairwoman Tzipi Livni has managed to brand herself as the ultimate oppositionist, and the public finds it hard to imagine her joining a Netanyahu-led government. Only 17% of the public want to see Livni in the next coalition, whereas 28% think that Labor should be there. The figure for Yair Lapid's Yesh Atid is 24%, which corresponds with a preference for Shas to be excluded.
The latest poll gives Lapid almost half the number of seats as is garnered by the Labor Party (9 versus 19), but he has managed to escape the accusations flying on the left, with only 8% believing that he is responsible for the splitting of the vote and the failure to form a single block.
Although Livni has tried to position herself as leader of the center-left block, the public doesn't buy it, and the overwhelming majority finds her the main guilty party and responsible for the fragmentation in the left camp. This is apparently the price for her hesitation and late entry into the race.
This is the first poll after Amir Peretz joined Livni, and her party has risen by three projected Knesset seats. It has still however not managed to get into double figures. Livni is still far from a duel with Netanyahu over leadership of the country.
Labor still leads the center-left block, with 19 projected seats, although there are fears in the party ranks that the slight drop in the polls published in the past few days may be turning into a trend, and the hope is that it is a matter of statistical error.
Poll results
The results show the projected number of seats for each party according to the current survey, followed by the number of seats in the previous survey at the end of November, and, in parentheses, the number of seats in the current Knesset.
Likud-Beytenu 39, 37 (42)
Labor 19, 20 (13)
Shas 10, 11 (11)
Habayit Hayehudi 10, 11 (7)
Yesh Atid 9, 10 (-)
Hatenuah 9, 6 (-)
United Torah Judaism 6, 6 (5)
Meretz 4, 5 (3)
Am Shalem 3, - (-)
Hadash 4, 4 (4)
National Democratic Assembly 4, 4 (4)
Ra'am-Ta'al 3, 3 (3)
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on December 13, 2012
© Copyright of Globes Publisher Itonut (1983) Ltd. 2012