Why opinion polls are partly to blame for Israel’s fifth election

GILAD GREENWALD argues opinion polling has been manipulated by journalists and politicians to bring on Israel’s political crisis

For the past four years, Israel has found itself in one of the most problematic and dangerous constitutional situations in its history, with unprecedented instability of the political system and with five consecutive political campaigns one after the other.

In such complex political situation, public opinion seeks control and certainty about the future. Election polls give media consumers a certain illusion of such control and confidence about what the future holds for them.

Due to the ongoing crisis, election polls have become perhaps the most popular practice of the Israeli media – even when for a moment there was a feeling that the system was stabilised with the establishment of the 36^th government, led by Naftali Bennett and Yair Lapid. Almost every evening (on TV), and every morning (in print newspapers) people encountered election polls, almost to the point that they became a "regular section" of the Israeli journalistic agenda, perhaps similar to the weather forecast or to traffic reports.

Contrary to popular opinion, the power of election polls is not necessarily in the reflection of political reality, but mainly in the media construction of this reality de facto.  The polls have three important impacts in:

First, the almost weekly polls, broadcast for the past year, were in fact a tool in the hands of the political right in Israel, the Likud party led by Benjamin Netanyahu, and many journalists associated with them, such as Amit Segal of Israeli Channel 12, who used the polls to weaken the Bennett-Lapid government, and to drag Israel to a fifth election, an election that will give Netanyahu another (perhaps last) opportunity to return to power.