Most polling stations in Israel opened at 7 a.m. on Tuesday, Oct. 27, for the election for the 26th Knesset, with voting scheduled to continue until 10 p.m. Some stations will operate on shorter schedules.
Some 7.33 million Israelis are eligible to vote, according to Israeli Central Elections Committee figures dated Sept. 6, an increase of 543,177 since the previous election four years ago.
The committee listed 12,018 regular polling stations nationwide, including 6,208 accessible stations.
It will be the country’s first general election since the Hamas-led massacre on Oct. 7, 2023.
Some 330,000 young Israelis are casting ballots for the first time, according to Israel’s Central Elections Committee.
“This is a celebration of Israeli democracy,” said Dean Livne, the committee’s acting director-general.
Thousands of committee employees had worked to ensure every voter could cast a ballot “easily and without fear,” his statement continued.
The committee also warned that rumors and misinformation may circulate online during the day. It urged the public to check the source and context of reports, images and videos before sharing them.
Election Day in Israel is a national holiday, with schools, kindergartens and most workplaces expected to close.
Voters choose party lists rather than directly electing a prime minister. Lists must receive at least 3.25% of valid votes to enter the Knesset.
Military voting began on Oct. 21 at Israel Defense Forces bases and outposts across operational arenas, including in Gaza, Lebanon and Syria.
More than 850 polling stations, many of them mobile, were deployed, according to the IDF, with voting continuing through Election Day subject to operational requirements.
Eligible Israeli diplomats serving abroad and their family members began voting on Oct. 15. President Isaac Herzog attended the opening of voting at Israel’s embassy in Baku, Azerbaijan, calling the election “a celebration of democracy” and urging citizens to vote.
Herzog on Monday night called on citizens to vote in the national election, urging them to “exercise your democratic right to influence the future of the state.”
“Election day is a celebration of Israeli democracy. This is the people’s day,” Herzog said in a video posted to X.
Proportional representation
Israeli democracy is based on a parliamentary system of proportional representation. This means that Israeli citizens do not vote directly for a prime minister or district representatives. They vote for a party that runs in a single, nationwide constituency, where the legislative body—the Knesset—has 120 seats.
A vote for a party is a vote for a list of Knesset candidates. The 120 Knesset seats are divided proportionally to the number of votes that each party wins. Thus, if a single party won 50% of the valid votes, it would secure 60 Knesset seats.
No party has ever won a majority of the votes, so every government has been formed by a coalition of parties.
In addition, parties must receive at least 3.25% of the valid votes to enter the Knesset; votes cast for parties that fail to reach this electoral threshold are discarded.
Choosing a prime minister
Although typically the leader of the largest party becomes prime minister, this is not always the case. The law stipulates that the Israeli president designates the member of the Knesset who has the best chance of forming a coalition with the task of forming a government.
The designated member of Knesset must present the proposed government and its policy guidelines to the Knesset and win its approval before taking office as prime minister.
If the designated member of Knesset is unable to do this, the president designates another member of Knesset to try.
The prime minister must moreover hold a Knesset seat while serving as the head of the government. Other ministers are not required to be lawmakers.
The Israeli president is elected by the Knesset for a seven-year tenure. Israel’s current president, Isaac Herzog, is scheduled to end his term in July 2028.
More than a century of democracy
A World Economic Forum ranking from 2019 places Israel among the world’s 20 oldest continuous democracies.
Although since its inception Israel has faced “wars, terrorism, security threats, political upheavals and profound social change,” it has always maintained its commitment to parliamentary democracy, the Foreign Ministry states.
“Israel’s democracy was born in adversity. Its endurance is one of the country’s greatest achievements,” it adds.
“Jewish, Muslim, Christian and Druze citizens, from cities and countryside, religious and secular, from every background and community, will participate [on Oct. 27] in the same democratic process. They may disagree profoundly about Israel’s future, but each has an equal vote in determining it,” the ministry says.