Israelis abroad fly home to vote as Netanyahu election showdown looms

Israelis living abroad are flying home to vote in Tuesday’s Knesset election on 27 October — the country’s first national vote since the 7 October 2023 Hamas attack — because Israeli law grants ordinary citizens no absentee ballot (The Japan Times).

Lital Lee Doron, a 35-year-old tech sales professional, spoke to Reuters by phone from Barcelona Airport on her way to Tel Aviv, saying she plans to vote for the opposition led by former military chief Gadi Eisenkot. “People think election results only affect those living in Israel, but they impact Israelis abroad just as much,” she said. “We went from an admired nation to an ostracized state.”

The nonpartisan Fly&Vote initiative, run by the US-based America-Israel Democracy (AID) Coalition, says more than 33,000 expatriates have registered — a figure first reported by Channel 12 and carried by The Times of Israel on 31 August. Israel permits absentee voting only for diplomats and emissaries posted abroad; everyone else must be in the country on election day.

Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud threatened legal action against Fly&Vote, accusing it of unlawful election financing — a suit it later withdrew under a compromise brokered by the Central Elections Committee chairman (The Times of Israel).

Some 7.3 million citizens are eligible to vote across 38 party lists, with parties needing 3.25% of the vote to enter the 120-seat Knesset, according to an Arab Center for Research and Policy Studies assessment.