Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu recently announced that he would participate in the 2026 parliamentary elections and claimed to win *. Israeli media previously reported that Netanyahu's current term tried to ensure that far-right parties remained in the ruling coalition by extending the war in Gaza, so as to "renew their life" for his administration. Now that a ceasefire agreement has been reached in Gaza, how will it affect the direction of Israel's political situation?
Netanyahu participated in a program on Israeli TV 14 on the 18th. When asked if he intended to seek *, he replied "yes". Then, Netanyahu was asked whether he would win the election in October 2026, and he answered "yes".
In the 2022 parliamentary elections, Netanyahu led the right-wing camp to win the majority seats in the parliament and become Israeli prime minister. Netanyahu is the longest-running prime minister in Israel, with more than 18 years cumulative. He has held this position several times since he first served as prime minister in 1996 and has been in power for 12 consecutive years.
Public poll: whether to be re-elected or unknown
During his current term, Netanyahu was exhausted from multiple pressures such as maintaining the ruling coalition and responding to personal corruption cases. After the outbreak of a new round of Palestinian-Israeli conflict, the Netanyahu government's response was criticized by the opposition party. Large-scale demonstrations against the war and demanding the release of detained Israeli personnel broke out repeatedly in the country. It was not until recently that Netanyahu's approval rating rose after Israel and the Palestinian Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) reached the first phase of the Gaza ceasefire agreement.
On September 26, at the United Nations Headquarters in New York, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu delivered a speech at the general debate of the 80th United Nations General Assembly. Representatives of many United Nations Member States stood up and left the table and walked out in protest. Photo by Xinhua Agency reporter Wu Xiaoling
Israeli television twelve television polls last week showed that if the elections were held now in Israel, the Likud group led by Netanyahu would win 27 seats in parliament, remaining the largest party in the 120-seat Israeli parliament.
Even so, Netanyahu’s reelection remains unknown. Several polls show that Netanyahu is almost as strong as his main opposition. Israeli former prime minister Benet is the main opponent that Netanyahu will face in the next election. Television twelve polls show that Benet’s political party, Benet 2026, is expected to win 22 seats in parliament, just behind the Likud group.
The right-wing camp led by the Likud group is expected to win 51 seats as a whole, which is not as strong as the opposition camp led by Bennett, which is currently expected to win 59 seats. However, as things stand, neither Netanyahu nor Bennett's camp can win the 60 seats needed to form a government, or half of all seats in parliament. The Times of Israel analyzed the results of opinion polls and believed that no matter which party, in the end, can only obtain enough seats to form a government by cooperating with one of the two small parties, but the cooperation intentions of the two small parties are not yet clear.
How the ceasefire in Gaza affects the political situation
For Netanyahu’s political career, the current implementation of the Gaza ceasefire is more like a double-edged sword.
Hussein Ibis, a scholar at the Gulf Arab States Institute in Washington, a US think tank, believes that reaching a ceasefire agreement and ending the conflict in Gaza will obviously help Netanyahu win voter support in the upcoming election.
However, the Israeli Prime Minister's Office issued a statement on the 19th saying that in view of Hamas's violation of the ceasefire agreement, Netanyahu instructed to take strong action against targets in the Gaza Strip. The Israeli army attacked many places in the Gaza Strip that day, and later said it would re-implement the ceasefire agreement.
The Israeli newspaper previously that Netanyahu was trying to ensure that far-right political parties remain in the ruling coalition by extending the fighting in Gaza and "extending" their rule. for this reason, Ibis believes that Netanyahu's political life as prime minister would be at risk if the current ceasefire agreement succeeded and the conflict in Gaza ended.
The current government led by Netanyahu is regarded as the "rightmost" government in Israeli history. At the end of 2022, with the support of the far-right parties Jewish Power Party and Religious Zionist Party, Netanyahu was able to successfully form a cabinet and serve as prime minister again.
The leaders of the two parties, Itamar ben-Guerrero and Biserre Smotrich, were “delegated” by Netanyahu in the government, but the two have repeatedly threatened to lead their respective parties out of the ruling coalition if a ceasefire with Hamas collapses the government.
Source: Xinhua News Agency