Zambia and the world, three times a day
Middle East · Politics · Israel Source-checked
Israel's new parliament held its opening session on Tuesday. Opposition leader Gadi Eisenkot has been asked to form a government, but neither he nor caretaker Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has a clear majority.
Israel’s new parliament, the 26th Knesset, was sworn in on Tuesday 10 November 2026. The day opened a period of political uncertainty after an October election that left neither side with a majority.
BBC News reports that Eisenkot’s bloc of four parties won 48 seats, while the bloc led by Netanyahu won 53. A majority needs 61 of the 120 seats. Almost half of the new members of parliament did not serve in the last one. France 24 says Eisenkot has been asked to form a government after more members backed him than backed Netanyahu. BBC says President Isaac Herzog gave him that task on Sunday. He has 28 days to build a coalition, with a possible extension of two weeks. Netanyahu stays on as caretaker prime minister until a new government is formed, which could take days or months.
The two Arab-led alliances, the United Arab List and the Joint List, won 19 seats between them after a rise in turnout among Arab voters. BBC says they could hold the balance of power. Netanyahu has ruled out governing with them, and three parties in Eisenkot’s bloc have opposed including them in a coalition. France 24 quotes an Israeli political analyst, Dahlia Scheindlin, who describes that reluctance as a self-imposed limit and says the result could be a stalemate or a fragile minority government. That is her view, not a forecast from the sources.
Both leaders used the opening session to warn against the other. Netanyahu told members not to depend on people he described as wanting the destruction of the Jewish state, and he urged a national unity government to face what he called the threat of a nuclear Iran. Eisenkot called the speech divisive and said Netanyahu was unfit to stay in office.
France 24 reports that Eisenkot’s party moved at once to set up a commission to investigate the failures that allowed the Hamas attack of 7 October 2023, something Netanyahu has long resisted. It also proposed repealing the earlier overhaul of the judiciary and says it has enough votes to elect Matan Kahana as speaker. About 200 right-wing protesters gathered outside parliament.
Eisenkot has said any party can join his proposed government if it accepts four principles, including recognising Israel as a Jewish and democratic state and backing national service for all groups. BBC notes these terms could be hard for some possible partners, in particular on the question of military service for ultra-Orthodox men.
Whoever can build a coalition will decide Israel's approach to the war, to Iran and to the courts, and the vote on a commission into 7 October could shape how the last three years are judged.
It is not yet clear that Eisenkot can reach 61 seats, or whether Arab-led parties will take part. The speaker vote and the commission bill had not been decided when the reports were published. Seat counts are as given by BBC News and were not checked against the Knesset website.
Each link goes to the specific article or document we used. Two articles carrying the same wire report count as one source.
Spotted a mistake? See our corrections process.
