Netanyahu's Likud still losing by 2 seats after U.S. speech, Israeli poll finds
The polls before Israel's March 17 election are still extremely tight, but if Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was hoping for a big boost from his high-profile speech to the U.S. Congress last week, he didn't get it, according to a recent poll for The Jerusalem Post. If the election were held today, the poll found, Netanyahu's Likud party would get 22 seats in the Knesset (parliament), while the center-left Zionist Union party would get 24.
The poll was conducted by Panels Research on March 4-5, the two days following Netanyahu's U.S. speech. A week earlier, the same pollsters had found Zionist Union leading Likud 25 to 23. When allied parties are included, the conservative and liberal blocs each have 56 seats, and Likud officials tell the Post that even if they lost by two seats, Netanyahu will still be able to form a government.
On Saturday night, at least 40,000 Israelis gathered in Tel Aviv's Rabin Square for an anti-Netanyahu rally headlined by former Mossad chief Meir Dagan, who told the crowd that the current prime minister is "the greatest strategic damage to Israel." A pro-Netanyahu rally will be held in the same place on March 14.
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