Eisenkot Gets the Mandate, but 19 Arab-Led MKs Decided It

Israel's President Isaac Herzog tasked opposition leader Gadi Eisenkot with forming the next government, informing him on Saturday evening and planning a formal handover ceremony on Sunday. The decision followed an election on October 27 that produced no majority bloc.

Eisenkot, leader of the centrist Yashar party and a former military chief, received 67 recommendations from the 120-member Knesset. Benjamin Netanyahu received 46. Seven MKs recommended no one.

Netanyahu's Likud won 27 seats, six more than Yashar. His right-wing, far-right and ultra-Orthodox bloc won 53 seats. Eisenkot's bloc won 48. Neither reached a majority.

What flipped the mandate was the two Arab-led alliances — the United Arab List and the Joint List — which together won an unprecedented 19 seats after a surge in Arab voter turnout.

Eisenkot now has 28 days to form a government, with a possible 14-day extension. If that window closes without a coalition, the process could lead to new elections.

His path is complicated. Divisions within the opposition and the need to hold together a coalition dependent on Arab-led parties whose support was decisive in the consultations present political obstacles. A crack in Netanyahu's bloc appeared when United Torah Judaism did not recommend him during consultations.

Eisenkot wrote on X: "Now is the time to form a national emergency government. I will do everything to ensure we are worthy."

But Eisenkot is not prime minister yet, and the coalition math that produced his mandate is the same math he must now hold together.