Israel’s final count leaves Netanyahu’s bloc at 53 of 120 seats, election officials say, as they push back on Likud’s ‘stolen’ claim

Israel finished counting the ballots from its Oct. 27 election this week, and the final tally leaves neither of the two big camps with a governing majority. According to the Central Elections Committee’s figures, as reported by Israel National News, Likud won 27 seats, Gadi Eisenkot’s Yashar 21, B’Yachad 12 and the Joint List 11. The Democrats and Raam each won eight seats; Yisrael Beytenu, Otzma Yehudit and United Torah Judaism took seven apiece; Shas and the Religious Zionist Party took six each. “All other parties failed to cross the electoral threshold,” the outlet reports (Israel National News). The Times of Israel told its readers on X that the committee published the final results “in the early hours of Friday morning” in Israel, which fell on Thursday afternoon, Pacific time (@TimesofIsrael on X). The committee keeps its own national results page online (votes26.bechirot.gov.il); that page answered this desk’s downloader with a bot check, so the seat figures here come from the outlets that quote it.

Add those seats up and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s camp — Likud, Otzma Yehudit, United Torah Judaism, Shas and Religious Zionism — holds 53 of the Knesset’s 120 seats. NBC News puts that result “well below the 68 it had controlled at its peak in the previous parliament” (NBC News). The four parties around Eisenkot — Yashar, B’Yachad, the Democrats and Yisrael Beytenu — hold 48. Raam and the Joint List together hold 19, a figure NBC describes as “historic gains” for parties led by Israel’s Arab minority (NBC News). Reuters, in its results graphic, calls that number “a record 19 seats” and says the vote “ended in deadlock” (Reuters graphics). A majority takes 61.

The committee also released turnout figures. According to Israel National News, turnout stood at 77.9%; officials counted 5,716,665 votes, of which 5,690,778 counted as valid and 25,887 as invalid. The threshold for entering the Knesset sat at 3.25%, or 184,947 votes. The committee added a caveat: the results “remain subject to election integrity checks and minor adjustments that may be made during the verification process,” the outlet reports (Israel National News).

The last ballots to come in included the so-called double envelopes — votes from soldiers, diplomats and others who cast ballots away from their home polling stations. Some of them took an unusual route. On election night, flooding in the south cut off roads around Eilat and the Arava, and the military flew dozens of ballot boxes from army bases to the Knesset in Jerusalem on an Israeli Air Force helicopter, Times of Israel military correspondent Emanuel Fabian reported on X, quoting the military: “The special transport operation was intended to ensure the ballot boxes reached the Knesset on time for the Central Elections Committee to count the votes” (@manniefabian on X). That airlift appears in the photo at the top of this page.

A fight over the result started before the count ended. Netanyahu and his Likud party alleged on Thursday that Arab-majority parties stole the election with help from foreign funding that, CBS News reports, they described as vote-buying. CBS News quotes the statement: “Israel’s elections have been stolen,” describing “an attack on democracy aimed at leading to a foreign takeover of the Knesset, the Islamization of Israel, and the overthrow of the right-wing government” (CBS News). JTA quotes a version posted on the prime minister’s X account: “The Ra’amgate affair is an earthquake. … They stole the elections in Israel” (JTA). The two outlets render the Hebrew slightly differently; this desk quotes each as published.

The claim centers on Qatar. According to JTA, Netanyahu alleges that Qatar secretly funded efforts to raise Arab turnout, which the outlet says “nearly doubled from the previous election” (JTA). Qatar’s foreign ministry rejects that. “We categorically deny allegations that Qatar has interfered in Israeli elections or funded any activities intended to influence their outcome,” spokesman Majed Al Ansari said, according to CBS News, which also quotes him: “Qatar should not be used as a scapegoat for the political failures of certain Israeli politicians” (CBS News).

Israel’s election officials have pushed back on the idea of a stolen vote, while confirming that an inquiry exists. Supreme Court Justice Noam Sohlberg, who chairs the Central Elections Committee, wrote to Shin Bet chief David Zini earlier in the week, according to JTA: “Serious suspicions have been brought to my attention regarding improper influence on the elections through foreign funding by outside actors operating against Israeli interests.” In the same letter, Sohlberg wrote, “I cannot attest to the nature of these suspicions,” and asked Zini to “uncover evidence to substantiate or refute the suspicions” within a week, JTA reports (JTA).

On Thursday, the committee’s acting director-general, Dean Livne, wrote in a letter that, in NBC’s rendering, there existed “no basis for allegations of systematic violations of electoral integrity” (NBC News). CBS, which describes the letter as sent to a committee member, translates it as “there is no basis to the claims regarding a systematic compromise of the integrity of the elections” (CBS News). On Friday, Livne recorded a statement, coordinated with the Shin Bet and with Sohlberg, saying the investigation “does not affect the final results that will be submitted to the President, nor does it concern any particular sector of the population,” JTA reports. He added: “However, reports published throughout the day are entirely unfounded” (JTA).

The Shin Bet, Israel’s domestic security agency, has asked the public to wait. “The Shin Bet has not yet completed its investigation, and any statements concerning the substance or nature of the suspicions under investigation do not reflect the agency’s position,” it said, according to JTA, adding: “Such statements should have been avoided.” The agency said the intelligence came from its own work and “did not come from any political party or political entity on either side of the political spectrum,” and that the probe “does not cast suspicion on, or accuse, an entire sector of society that went out to vote democratically and legally” (JTA). CBS quotes a slightly different translation of that last line (CBS News).

Eisenkot, whose Yashar party now leads the opposition bloc, accuses Netanyahu of trying to undo a loss. “What is already clear is that Likud and Netanyahu have embarked on an orchestrated and organized campaign to delegitimize the election results,” he said, according to JTA (JTA). In a social media post quoted by CBS, he said Netanyahu “is leading alongside his partners an improper influence operation on the Israeli public aimed at delaying the publication of the election results on time” (CBS News). Raam leader Mansour Abbas said his party has “no connection whatsoever to the affair in question or to any other such affairs” and pledged to cooperate with investigators, JTA reports; he told Netanyahu: “There will be nothing, because there is nothing” (JTA).

Voices on the government side push the other way. Knesset Speaker Amir Ohana, of Likud, called the allegations the most serious in Israel’s democratic history, and National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir urged the arrest of Arab party leaders suspected of involvement, according to JTA (JTA). President Isaac Herzog backed a full investigation but warned against blaming Arab voters as a group: “Even at a moment like this, we must not tarnish an entire community that sought to exercise its right to vote and take an active part in democracy,” he said Thursday, JTA reports (JTA).

Scholars quoted by JTA describe the Arab turnout as homegrown. Rami Zeedan, a professor of Israel studies who did fieldwork in Israel this summer, told the outlet: “The exceptional turnout was therefore not inexplicable. … It reflected a genuine and highly visible effort to remove Netanyahu and his government.” He warned that “an investigation into specific financial or criminal allegations will be transformed into a sweeping claim that the Arab vote itself was fraudulent.” Anwar Mhajne, a political scientist from Umm al-Fahm, wrote to JTA that the allegations “risk achieving Netanyahu’s objective before the investigation concludes” (JTA).

Neither bloc has an easy road to 61. Before the vote, both Netanyahu and Eisenkot ruled out a government with the two main Arab parties, NBC reports (NBC News). Reuters notes that Eisenkot has cited “a lack of shared values” with them (Reuters graphics). Yair Golan, who leads the Democrats inside Eisenkot’s bloc, has called for a government built “in partnership” with Arab parties: “We must no longer accept Netanyahu’s racist division between Jewish votes and Arab votes,” he wrote on X on Wednesday, according to NBC (NBC News). JTA lays out one path for Eisenkot: a coalition with Arab parties, or a minority government they back from outside (JTA). CBS adds that once the new Knesset takes its oath, Eisenkot’s bloc and the Arab parties “could begin passing laws given that they will control a majority in the parliament,” even without a new government (CBS News).

The calendar now runs through President Herzog. According to Ynet’s explainer by Amir Ettinger, the committee must publish the results in Reshumot, the official gazette, by Wednesday, Nov. 4; Herzog expects to begin consultations that day, and the 26th Knesset takes its oath on Tuesday, Nov. 10 (Ynetnews). Herzog then has seven days from publication to pick the lawmaker he judges most likely to form a government. That person gets 28 days, plus up to 14 more. If that fails, a second candidate gets 28 days; after that, 61 lawmakers have 21 days to name a candidate by petition. If every route fails, “the Knesset is automatically dissolved and Israel heads to another election,” Ynet writes (Ynetnews). Netanyahu stays on as caretaker prime minister until a new government takes office, CBS reports (CBS News).

One more deadline matters for the fraud dispute. Sohlberg asked the Shin Bet for findings within a week, ahead of the deadline for filing election appeals, JTA reports. In theory, a court could void an election in whole or in part if it found that wrongdoing changed the result, the outlet notes, though overturning an entire election has no precedent in Israeli history (JTA). This desk’s Oct. 29 report, written from election-night figures, put the Arab-led parties at about 18 seats; the final count gives them 19.