Tens of thousands of Israeli expats fly home to vote in seismic election

Tens of thousands of Israeli citizens abroad, including estimates of hundreds from Australia, are travelling to Israel to vote in the country's most consequential election in decades.

Polling indicates Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu could face a stiff challenge to hold onto power in a vote largely seen as a referendum on his leadership and handling of Hamas's October 7 attacks.

His main challenger is Gadi Eisenkot, a former Israeli military chief who leads the newly established Yashar opposition party.

Political activists mobilised around the world to bring Israeli citizens overseas to the country to vote, given ballots can only be cast in person on election day, with exceptions for serving soldiers and diplomats.

The AID Coalition, a US-based non-profit which describes itself as non-partisan, estimates that as many as 67,000 voters are returning to Israel, based on surveys of expatriates and registration data gathered for its Fly&Vote initiative.

It says about half are flying in from the United States, with others from Europe, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.

Among those who have travelled to Israel is Anat Dror, who has been living in Melbourne for almost five years and recently became an Australian citizen.

"The sentiment for us is that right now, voting is absolutely essential. It's something that absolutely comes from the heart and no-one would be able to talk me out of it," she told the ABC.

"I'm coming here at the very expensive cost of missing out on work days and paying for a very expensive ticket and missing my kids at home … all of these are not deterring any of us from coming here to vote.

"This is our motherland and our motherland needs us right now."

In September, the Likud party tried to block the AID Coalition's Fly&Vote initiative by lodging an appeal with the elections committee, but withdrew the case after reaching an agreement.

'I don't trust any of them'

The most recent data from Israeli television networks Channel 12 and Channel 13, released on Thursday, put Mr Eisenkot's Yashar a few seats ahead of Mr Netanyahu's Likud.

After Tuesday's vote both parties will need to embark on complicated coalition negotiations to secure the 61-seat majority required to form government.

Ms Dror said Israel was still reeling from the trauma of Hamas's deadly assault on October 7, 2023, and the legacy of that day cast a long shadow over this election.

But she argued the broader societal challenges Israel is facing began emerging before the terrorist attacks, including intense cost-of-living pressures.

She said Mr Netanyahu's government needed to go, but did not want to publicly back a particular candidate in the so-called "change" camp: the anti-Netanyahu parties, including Yashar, trying to end his tenure.

"What one single politician, do I trust his words or her words? The answer is none of them. I don't trust any of them, nor should anyone ever trust politicians' words before elections," she said.

"They will say everything because they are indeed politicians.

"What I'm counting on isn't any one individual. I'm counting on the change bloc to have the ability to oversee differences, oversee personal gain for the sake of actually building a coalition that is diverse."

Ms Dror said she believed anywhere between 500 and 1,000 Israeli citizens from Australia were making the journey.

"We have a really big Israeli WhatsApp group in Australia, and we made a joke that maybe we should meet for coffee here in Tel Aviv instead of in Melbourne," she said.

Another Israeli citizen travelling to the country to vote, Guy Marom, moved to Australia with his family during the COVID-19 pandemic.

As he packed his bags in Sydney's north-east, he was also undecided on which candidate to back, but insisted one of the "change" parties would get his vote.

"Most of them, at least, have leaders that I consider trustworthy, and I hope they will shape Israel differently than what it is today," he told the ABC.

"I think [Netanyahu is] maybe not the single cause, but I think he's contributing to the division amongst the people."

ABC/Associated Press