Israel election exit polls deadlocked: both blocs on 51 seats, Arab parties projected to win 18

Exit polls after voting in Israel's election showed no clear winner. Updated exit polling put both Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's Likud-led bloc and the opposition bloc led by former military chief of staff Gadi Eisenkot's Yashar party at 51 seats each in the 120-member Knesset.

Neither camp is anywhere near the 61 seats required to form a government. Under the updated figures, unaligned Arab parties were expected to hold 18 seats, leaving both major camps 10 seats short of an absolute majority.

Exit polling data suggested that the leading Arab-led parties, the Joint List and Ra'am, are set to hold a record number of seats in the Knesset. Early indications put voter turnout among Palestinian citizens of Israel at around 80 percent, their highest levels in decades, breaking 1999 records, Israel's Channel 12 reported on Tuesday.

Overall voter turnout was also historic, reaching 77.7 percent in Tuesday's election, its highest level since 1999, according to the Central Elections Committee. Palestinian citizens of Israel make up about 21 percent of the country's population of 10 million and have traditionally voted at lower rates than Jewish Israelis.

The leader of Ra'am, or the United Arab List, Mansour Abbas, told Channel 12: 'With the numbers we have now, there is no government.' He said he hopes the final results will allow the anti-Netanyahu bloc, including his party, to win the 61 seats required to form a government. Ra'am, which currently holds five seats in the Knesset, joined the coalition that governed Israel from 2021 to 2022. Abbas added that both main blocs reached out to his party before and after the election.

Despite narrower exit poll figures, opposition leaders insisted the result was a defeat for the government. Eisenkot, head of the Yashar party, told supporters after voting closed that the initial projections showed a 'complete lack of confidence in Netanyahu and the October 7 government', according to AFP. Opposition leader Yair Lapid said in a statement: 'Don't let anyone confuse you: the Netanyahu bloc has suffered a crushing defeat. This is a total collapse and the public has told them to go home.'

Senior figures in Netanyahu's camp pushed back against the opposition declarations, saying the final results could shift the balance. Gideon Saar, Israel's foreign minister and a key Netanyahu ally, dismissed opposition statements as 'premature' on social media, writing that Likud remained the largest single party in parliament. Supporters at Eisenkot's watch party in Tel Aviv cheered the projections, but Netanyahu's allies argued the final count could change the balance.

Netanyahu and his far-right coalition made last-ditch efforts on Tuesday to get their supporters to the polls, warning of surging voter turnout among Palestinian citizens of Israel — a tactic Arab politicians denounced as racist and inflammatory. Cars flying Netanyahu's Likud party flags drove through Jerusalem blaring the Islamic call to prayer and urging supporters to cast their ballots because 'Arabs are voting', witnesses said. On social media, Netanyahu highlighted long queues at polling stations in Arab communities and wrote: 'If we don't wake up now, we'll find ourselves with a government of Mansour Abbas and Ahmad Tibi.'

Leaders of Arab political factions highlighted their potential role in upcoming coalition negotiations. 'We will transform the mandate we received into a new reality in the country,' Mansour Abbas told reporters. At the Joint List alliance headquarters in Nazareth, candidate Faten Gattas told supporters that high participation among Palestinian citizens of Israel aimed to block the return of Netanyahu's nationalist coalition. 'We refuse the occupation and racism, and we will remain here,' Gattas said, according to Reuters.

Speaking to Al Jazeera, Alon Pinkas, a former Israeli ambassador, said creating a government might prove difficult for parties such as Eisenkot's, because they promised not to form coalitions with Arab parties during the campaign. 'There's a price to pay,' Pinkas said, because 'the Arabs can't be kept outside and only being considered and co-opted when you need their votes'. He added that the Arab-led lists will make demands that a Jewish-led coalition government may not support.

Al Jazeera's Nour Odeh, reporting from Ramallah in the occupied West Bank, called the election 'an existential moment for Palestinian-Israelis'. She noted the record turnout drew even voters who would usually boycott elections and did not believe it would amount to any influence or change their reality. She said the Knesset has passed more than 100 laws discriminating against Palestinian citizens of Israel, who also face discrimination in receiving state funds.

With neither camp reaching a governing majority, political analysts suggested smaller parties would be key deciders as formal coalition talks begin in the coming days.