Paul Barry

Investigative journalist and best-selling author. Former host of ABC Media Watch. All views are my own. Retweets not necessarily endorsements.

[Amit Segal @AmitSegal]

Last night, the exit polls told one story: Netanyahu had lost, but it wasn’t clear who on the other side had won. This morning, the results are telling another. Netanyahu hasn’t won yet, but the change bloc has clearly lost.

I’ve covered politics since the start of the century. I have never seen a camp organize for an election as impeccably, as efficiently and as energetically as the change bloc did. It signed model surplus-vote agreements, so that no leftover votes would go to waste, and ran an unprecedented operation flying Israelis home from abroad to vote. And by the actual count, it ended up with more or less the same number of seats as in the last election.

Demography beat energy, and the message also proved flawed and unsuccessful. The public wasn’t convinced that the war had been a total victory, as Netanyahu claimed, but it also refused to buy the opposition’s claim that it was a total failure. It was repelled by Haredi draft-dodging, but didn’t think the solution was a minority government propped up by draft refusers and anti-Zionists. It was disgusted when ultra-Orthodox protesters chanted “We do not believe in the rule of the Zionists,” but it was just as shocked when “Biladi, Biladi,” the Palestinian national anthem, was sung at the Joint List’s headquarters last night.

Netanyahu’s position changed completely between the release of the exit polls and the arrival of the real results. Last night it seemed clear that Knesset Speaker Amir Ohana, a Likud loyalist, would be ousted and that, one way or another, Gadi Eisenkot, the former IDF chief of staff, would form a minority government. Now, by the criteria Eisenkot himself set, he has lost the legitimacy to form such a government. He promised he wouldn’t rely on the Arab parties’ votes, yet without a majority he would now need the active support of the Joint List, which looks futile and pointless. In post-October 7 Israel, there is no chance that a coalition including six candidates who lost immediate family to Hamas could last long alongside Joint List lawmakers who claim Hamas is simply a charitable organization.

After the 1967 war, Defense Minister Moshe Dayan famously said Israel was waiting for the Arabs to call. In the same spirit, Netanyahu in effect told the change camp before dawn: here’s my phone number, feel free to use it. Yisrael Beiteinu’s Avigdor Lieberman, former Prime Minister Naftali Bennett and Eisenkot now face a dilemma from hell. They can go to another election, one that Israelis abroad will no longer fly home for. They can try to join Netanyahu’s bloc on tough terms, breaking their campaign pledges never to sit with him. Or they can beg the Islamist Ra’am and the Joint List, now drunk on their success, for support.

And one final note: for the entire campaign, we searched for a third bloc, a centrist unity bloc between Netanyahu and his rivals. Candidates included Benny Gantz and former UN Ambassador Gilad Erdan, former general Ofer Winter and economist Yaron Zelekha, former Culture Minister Hili Tropper and who even remembers who else. They all collapsed, evaporated or vanished. And now it turns out the unity bloc may have been the Arab parties all along. Their historic, almost hysterical turnout, at rates that will need careful examination, shattered both sides’ dreams of a 61-seat majority. It reminded Jews on both sides that, after years of division, they may have to learn to sit together after all.

https://t.co/QMRRwZBFNJ

[William Dalrymple @DalrympleWill]

Excellent analysis by @owenjonesjourno
Deeply fucking depressing though

[William Dalrymple @DalrympleWill]

"Q. How democratic is the Israeli vote – and who is being disenfranchised?

A: About 15 million people live in areas under Israeli control. Just over 7 million Jewish Israelis and 1.7 million Palestinian citizens of Israel live within the country’s pre-1967 borders, known as the “green line”, and have full voting rights.

In the occupied West Bank, more than 500,000 Israeli settlers can vote. They live among 3.1 million Palestinians who are subject to military rule and do not have the right to vote.

In occupied East Jerusalem more than 230,000 Israelis with voting rights live among 350,000 Palestinians who cannot vote.

Two million Palestinians in Gaza, who live under Israeli military occupation, according to the international court of justice, also have no vote."
https://t.co/Q9y0IDlLUQ

[Dr Vyom Sharma @drvyom]

You won't see this on bluesky. I'm never leaving.

[Paul Barry @TheRealPBarry]

'Netanhyau has lost. But has Eisenkot won?' Another take on the Israel elections from Nadav Eyal, whom I spoke to on ABC Saturday Extra a few days ago. https://t.co/nc7NUbCf5B

[Paul Barry @TheRealPBarry]

Netanyahu’s Likud the largest party, according to exit polls. Change coalition looks like falling short if this is correct.

[Amit Segal @AmitSegal]

The first exit polls are out, and the winner of the 2026 Israeli election appears to be the Arabs. As most major polls predicted, no bloc has a definitive majority. Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud is the largest party in every exit poll, but what comes next remains an open question.

We are now in what might be called the journalist’s danger zone, where an overconfident prediction can stain the rest of your career. In 2015, the exit polls showed Likud and Isaac Herzog’s Zionist Union roughly tied at 27 or 28 seats each, and both camps claimed victory. The final result was Likud 30, Zionist Union 24, a six-seat gap no exit poll saw coming. So let’s stick to what we know.

All six exit polls tell the same basic story: Likud is the largest party, with 24 to 30 seats, ahead of Yashar, led by former military chief of staff Gadi Eisenkot, at 19 to 23, and neither bloc reaches 61. Five of the six have Netanyahu’s bloc at 50 to 55 and the change bloc at 49 to 53. The outlier is Channel 14, which gives Netanyahu’s bloc 60. Arab parties hold the balance with 16 to 18 seats, and the parties of Ofer Winter, a reserve brigadier general, and Yoaz Hendel, a former communications minister, fall below the threshold in every poll. In short, no one has a clear path to 61.

Taking the polls at their word, three options remain: new elections, a minority government or unity.

With neither bloc at the magic number in any exit poll, if no one can form a government, Israel goes back to the polls within 90 days, with Netanyahu as caretaker until then. As for a minority government, the prospects aren’t good: the change bloc plus the more moderate Ra’am comes to only 59 or 60 in most polls. That’s enough to beat Netanyahu’s 50 if the Joint List abstains, but it would leave the government dependent on an explicitly anti-Zionist party.

The final option, and one made more likely by tonight’s numbers, is unity. Likud and Yashar win 46 to 49 seats together, and 58 to 62 with former Prime Minister Naftali Bennett’s Beyachad. With the Arab path so fraught, this may be the road Netanyahu and Eisenkot end up taking, though it will be a bumpy one.

In the history of Israeli elections, 2026 will be remembered for a dramatic, historic, unprecedented surge in Arab turnout. Arab voters beat every forecast, including the Joint List’s own internal polling. For most of the day, Arab turnout was actually higher than Jewish turnout, something hard to believe for anyone familiar with the usual 20-point gap, which has now closed. Driven by soaring crime and the promise of a reunited Joint List, they came to the polls in droves, and the exit polls give the Arab parties 16 to 18 seats.

Meanwhile, garments are being rent and calls for repentance echo through the Haredi city of Bnei Brak, as disillusionment over the draft has translated into a drop in turnout. Shas and United Torah Judaism won 18 seats together last time. Tonight’s exit polls give them 12 to 16, and both Channel 12 and Kan have UTJ at six, the number its own officials said they wouldn’t be surprised by.

Here is where we add the asterisks. Shy voters are no more forthcoming on the way out of the booth than on the way in, so surprises may still be in store. Historically, shyness has been a condition of right-wing voters. This time, all eyes are on the Haredi Public party. The exit polls have it below a threshold that tonight’s turnout has pushed even higher, but it may still cut off just enough oxygen to leave the Haredi parties in Netanyahu’s camp gasping.

But the real game changer is the 600,000 or so double-envelope ballots sitting in a presumably very large pile at the Knesset. These are cast away from voters’ home polling stations: soldiers, diplomats, hospital patients, prisoners, polling staff and people using accessible stations. They are not a random sample (soldiers, for example, are young and don’t vote like the general public), and in past elections they have moved a seat or two. With every exit poll placing both parties below the threshold, these ballots are the last hope for Hendel’s Reservists and Winter’s Amcha Yisrael. In 2021, some of the first exit polls had Mansour Abbas’s Ra’am below the threshold, which would have handed Netanyahu’s bloc roughly 61 seats. Ra’am ended up with four, and Netanyahu ended up in opposition.

The election is far from over. Stay tuned.

https://t.co/U4FFSxxkES

[Aaron Rupar @atrupar]

Trump's affordability message: "You could even come to Mar-a-Lago. You'll be my guest. The problem is that for $5,000 the most you'll be able to buy is a hamburger and maybe a small dessert. I'm not even sure you could buy that! No, don't go there. It's not a good place if you're price conscious."

[Sina Toossi @SinaToossi]

On this Israeli election day, I’d recommend reading this extraordinary @haaretzcom interview with billionaire Ronald Lauder, president of the World Jewish Congress and once one of Benjamin Netanyahu’s closest confidants.

One of Lauder’s most striking conclusions: “I realized at the end of the day that Israel really didn't want peace, but they wanted dominance.”

This is coming from someone who helped launch Netanyahu’s political career, introduced him to powerful figures in American politics and media, and secretly negotiated with Hafez al-Assad and Rafik Hariri on his behalf in the late 1990s.

In one of the interview’s biggest revelations, Lauder says Netanyahu agreed to a comprehensive peace deal with Syria and Lebanon, including withdrawal from the Golan Heights, but ultimately refused to sign it for political reasons.

“He chose politics over peace. He put his political future before the deal.”

Now 82, Lauder describes his profound disillusionment with Israel’s direction. After decades of supporting Israeli and Jewish institutions, he has sold his Tel Aviv apartment, given away his Be’er Sheva property, and says he has no intention of returning to Israel.

He warns that Netanyahu’s dependence on figures like Ben-Gvir and Smotrich is damaging Israel, alienating diaspora Jews and eroding support in Washington.

The interview is also full of fascinating details about Lauder’s role in Netanyahu’s political rise. The two became close friends in the 1980s, when Netanyahu was Israel’s ambassador to the UN, speaking almost daily at times.

Lauder says he introduced Netanyahu to speech coach Lilyan Wilder to improve his public speaking and, crucially, to Republican strategist Arthur Finkelstein, who would become instrumental in Netanyahu’s electoral success.

When Netanyahu left New York to pursue a political career in Israel, Lauder threw him a farewell party attended by some of the most influential figures in American media and politics, including Rupert Murdoch and the head of the New York Times.

Lauder recalls opening doors for Netanyahu and helping him cultivate the relationships that would underpin his rise to power.

What makes this interview so revealing is that Lauder is no longtime critic of Israel. He had been a committed Zionist, a Republican power broker, and a man who spent decades financing Jewish institutions, cultivating relationships with Arab leaders, and pursuing diplomatic openings on Israel’s behalf.

A fascinating read 👇

https://t.co/Mc02HpdIou

[Paul Barry @TheRealPBarry]

For the 19th time.

[Media Watch @ABCmediawatch]

A bona fide climate scientist told us this was a bona fide climate beat-up.

#MediaWatch

[Decoding Fox News @DecodingFoxNews]

A protester yelled "Shove that ballroom up your fat ass" to Trump at his rally in Mississippi on Monday night. This clip contains two versions of the moment. The first is how it aired on a livestream. In the second I increased the audio for that moment.

[Mike Carlton @MikeCarlton01]

‘…and I’

So help me God…

[Anonymous @YourAnonNews]

Holy shit. Elon's dad's opinions & beliefs in this clip explain A LOT about Elon. The entire family are loony racist assholes who deny reality on a whim.

[Hugh Riminton @hughriminton]

Nobel Prize-winning economist rethinks his previous disdain for unions: “Their decline is contributing to the falling wage share, to the widening gap between executives and workers, to community destruction, and to rising populism.” https://t.co/Ye2fjylwjt

[Paul Barry @TheRealPBarry]

@melele129996 No, but being racist is, and you are sick.

[Paul Barry @TheRealPBarry]

Wow.

https://t.co/Hl3JwWJu5y

[Paul Barry @TheRealPBarry]

Great story. ABC TV Australian Story. Monday 8pm or on Iview.

https://t.co/F1DM8eLtKX

[Simon Kuper @KuperSimon]

I've been in France since 2002 and have never seen the streets so violent nor the politics so extreme. From the sacking of the supermarket on my street to the prospect of Présidente Le Pen, here's me @FT including thoughts from 2 French Nobel laureates https://t.co/at5ourNOZF

[ALASTAIR CAMPBELL @campbellclaret]

“These are not serious people”. Too right. But they are doing a lot of damage until they’re gone.

[Jay in Kyiv @JayinKyiv]

Likely one of the best one liners in Presidential history.

[Mike Carlton @MikeCarlton01]

Sane, measured reporting on the man arrested for the Helen Haines attack. As opposed to the disgraceful, rabid rants of the usual hacks at NewsCorpse. https://t.co/hwZfGHTd8P