Israel election: From Peres to Netanyahu, how exit polls have got it wrong before

Counting of votes in Israel's pivotal elections have begun. Israel elections committee's latest update states that Netanyahu bloc leads after 50 per cent of votes counted. Previously, according to exit polls, the race for the Knesset has tightened dramatically with Netanyahu bloc projected to win 55 seats, 49 for the Gadi Eisenkot led opposition bloc and 16 for the Arab parties. Voter turnout in Israel's Oct 27 election stood at 77.7 per cent as of 10 pm, the highest level of voter participation recorded at this hour since 1999. This is Israel’s first election since the Hamas-led October 7, 2023, Gaza and Iran wars.

While Benjamin Netanyahu has exuded confidence in forming the government, declared that "the public has voted for change" and that Prime Minister Netanyahu has lost the people's trust. However, history suggests that it is too early to declare victory, specially when it is based on exit polls.

Also Read: Israel elections: Record voter turnout in decades

From Peres to Netanyahu, how exit polls have gone wrong before

The most famous failures occurred in 1996, 2015, where initial network projections heavily miscalculated the final block configurations. Because a shift of just one or two seats can completely flip who has the mandate to form a 61-seat majority coalition in the 120-seat Knesset, early television exit polls frequently create false victory narratives.

Also Read: Netanyahu claims right-wing bloc has ‘decisive majority’, rejects exit polls

1. The 1996 Election

The 1996 prime ministerial election remains the ultimate cautionary tale in Israeli polling history. In the Exit Poll Projection, television screens at 10:00 PM, Shimon Peres was projected to beat Benjamin Netanyahu by a narrow margin. Relying on these numbers, Peres's team began celebrating, and the media declared him the winner. Later, when the actual ballots were counted overnight, the momentum shifted entirely and Netanyahu had won the election by a thin margin of 29,457 votes. This was the origin of famous Israeli political phrase: "Went to sleep with Peres, woke up with Netanyahu."

2. 2009 – Livni's Premature Victory

Exit polls showed Tzipi Livni, head of the centrist Kadima party, winning one more seat than Netanyahu’s Likud. Livni delivered a sweeping victory speech on television. However, the exit polls failed to capture the broader reality that the right-wing bloc as a whole was much larger, making it impossible for Livni to form a coalition. Netanyahu ultimately formed the government instead.

3. The 2015 Election

Leading up to the 2015 legislative election, polls indicated a massive surge for Isaac Herzog’s center-left Zionist Union. When voting ended, Channels 10 and 2 projected a dead heat at 27–28 seats each for Netanyahu’s Likud and Herzog’s Zionist Union. Channel 11 actually gave the Zionist Union a one-seat advantage, signaling that Netanyahu's decade-long grip on power might be over. The exit polls failed to capture a massive, late-afternoon surge of right-wing voters responding to Netanyahu's urgent election-day video warnings. When the official votes were verified, Likud won a decisive victory with 30 seats to the Zionist Union's 24, allowing Netanyahu to easily form a right-wing coalition.

What Netanyahu said in post-election speech?

Netanyahu rejected the exit polls and reiterated his call for unity among Jewish and Zionist political groups. He opposed the formation of a government dependent on Arab parties he described as anti-Zionist, alleging that some of them support Hamas and call Israeli soldiers “murderers and war criminals.” Mentioning Iran in his pitch once again, he claimed that “Iran is weaker than ever, Israel is stronger than ever." He added that along with US President Donald Trump, Israel will end the Iranian threat once and for all.