Israel’s election is almost upon us. There’s been no shortage of analysis of its trends, but most of these have rightly come with the caveat that polling in Israel is subject to several methodological problems. In addition, the outcome in several past elections (e.g., 1977, 2006, 2013) has been a surprise to both analysts and pollsters in part because many people only make up their minds on the day they vote.
Bearing this in mind, Michael Koplow, Guy Ziv, and I thought it might be fun–which is not to say stake our professional reputations on it–to try to predict the vote, and then to compare our predictions. The results are interesting.
Note that voting in Israel closes the night of Tuesday, March 17. It will take an extra couple of days to count all the ballots, including those from abroad (diplomats and soldiers).
Comments welcome!
Party | Michael
Koplow |
Brent
Sasley |
Guy
Ziv |
Likud | 23 | 20 | 20 |
Zionist Union | 22 | 24 | 25 |
Yesh Atid | 15 | 13 | 13 |
Joint Arab List | 12 | 13 | 12 |
Koolanu | 12 | 9 | 9 |
Bayit Yehudi | 11 | 13 | 12 |
United Torah Judaism | 7 | 7 | 7 |
Shas | 6 | 8 | 8 |
Yisrael Beiteinu | 4 | 4 | 5 |
Meretz | 4 | 5 | 5 |
Yachad | 4 | 4 | 4 |
TOTAL | 120 | 120 | 120 |