Netanyahu’s Likud Party to be largest in Knesset, reports Channel 12 Exit Poll; no clear winner in Israeli election

• Netanyahu's Likud party to win 24 of 120 seats in Knesset.
• Party led by Netanyahu's rival Eisenkot to win 22 of 120 seats.

Exit polls of this kind, showing a narrow lead but no clear winner, are the standard opening of an Israeli coalition phase rather than an endpoint: past Israeli elections have repeatedly produced a similar pattern in which the largest party's seat count matters less than whether either bloc can assemble a working majority, and initial exit polls have on previous occasions shifted once actual counts come in. The relevant sequence is well established, the president's mandate consultations, weeks of coalition bargaining, and the risk of a caretaker continuation or another snap vote if no coalition forms, a cycle Israeli politics has run through several times in recent years. The distinguishing question is not Likud's plurality but whether Netanyahu's natural partners collectively clear the threshold, since centre-right and religious bloc arithmetic has historically decided these outcomes. For markets the transmission channel in such episodes runs through the shekel and local assets first, with broader regional risk premia in crude and gold only engaging when coalition outcomes shift the trajectory of active conflict policy. The immediate tells are the gap between exit polls and final results, the smaller parties hovering near the electoral threshold, and any early statements from potential kingmaker factions.