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1992 Israeli legislative election

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1992 Israeli legislative election
← 1988
23 June 1992
1996 →
Turnout77.38%
Party Leader Vote % Seats +/–
Labor Yitzhak Rabin 34.65 44 +5
Likud Yitzhak Shamir 24.89 32 −8
Meretz Shulamit Aloni 9.58 12 +2
Tzomet Rafael Eitan 6.36 8 +6
Mafdal Zevulun Hammer 4.95 6 +1
Shas Aryeh Deri 4.94 6 0
UTJ Avraham Yosef Shapira 3.29 4 −3
Hadash Tawfiq Ziad 2.39 3 −1
Moledet Rehavam Ze'evi 2.38 3 +1
Mada Abdulwahab Darawshe 1.56 2 +1
This lists parties that won seats. See the complete results below.
Prime Minister before Prime Minister after
Yitzhak Shamir
Likud		 Yitzhak Rabin
Labor Party

Elections for the 13th Knesset were held in Israel on 23 June 1992. The election resulted in the formation of a Labor government, led by Yitzhak Rabin, helped by the failure of several small right wing parties to pass the electoral threshold.[1] Voter turnout was 77%.[2]

Background

The First Intifada, which began in 1987 and impacted the outcome of the 1988 election, had not ended by 1992.

In 1990, Labor's Shimon Peres tried to piece together a left-wing government against the Likud, which was known as the dirty trick. However, Agudat Yisrael bailed on the deal, and Peres's plan collapsed. He resigned from Labor leadership, and was replaced with former Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin.

The breakout of the Gulf War had major ramifications for Israeli politics. Iraqi strikes on Israel in early 1991 killed 76 Israelis, and blame was placed onto the Likud for a poor response. While Iraq's leader Saddam Hussein had hoped Israel would retaliate and get Middle Eastern countries to support Iraq in the war, Jordan and the United States convinced Israel not to strike back. This had the effect of making the Likud look weak on defence issues.

The Gulf War also led to the further fragmentation of the left-wing Progressive List for Peace, as its Jewish members left over the party's support for Hussein's regime.

Rabin's Labour became more popular for its strong defence policy, which convinced Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir to attempt negotiations with the Palestine Liberation Organization at the Madrid Conference of 1991. This was unpopular with right-wing voters, many of whom flocked to the radical-right Tzomet party, which withdrew from Shamir's government due to the conference.[3]

In October 1991, the electoral threshold was raised from 1% to 1.5%. This was the first reform to the threshold since 1949. Previous proposals to raise it to 4% in the 1950s and the 1960s failed due to the protests of smaller parties.[4][5] This time, smaller parties, including Mafdal and Tehiya were supportive of raising the threshold.

The downfall of the Soviet Union in December 1991 accelerated the aliyah of its Jewish population. From 1989 to 1991, over 340,000 Soviet Jews moved to Israel. Due to the Aliyah law, all Jewish immigrants to Israel are granted immediate citizenship and the right to vote. Initial polls predicted they would vote for Likud and other right-wing parties, due to their perceived dislike for socialism.[6] A late 1990 PORI poll showed that 78% of Soviet Israelis surveyed would vote for a right-wing party.[7] However, their votes began to shift away from the right, as they shared the general dissatisfaction for the Likud.

Parliament factions

The table below lists the parliamentary factions represented in the 12th Knesset.

Name Ideology Symbol Leader 1988 result Seats at 1992
dissolution
Votes (%) Seats
Likud National liberalism מחל Yitzhak Shamir 31.1%
40 / 120
38 / 120
Labor[a] Social democracy אמת Yitzhak Rabin 30.0%
39 / 120
38 / 120
Meretz Progressivism
Secularism		 —[b] Shulamit Aloni
Yair Tzaban
Amnon Rubinstein		 — did not exist[c]
10 / 120
Shas Religious conservatism
Populism		 שס Aryeh Deri 4.7%
6 / 120
5 / 120
Agudat Yisrael Religious conservatism ג Moshe Ze'ev Feldman 4.5%
5 / 120
4 / 120
Ratz Progressivism
Secularism		 רצ Shulamit Aloni 4.3%
5 / 120
 no longer existed[c]
Mafdal Religious Zionism ב Avner Shaki 3.9%
5 / 120
5 / 120
Hadash Communism
Socialism		 ו Meir Vilner 3.7%
4 / 120
4 / 120
Tehiya Ultranationalism
Revisionist Zionism		 ת Yuval Ne'eman
Geula Cohen		 3.1%
3 / 120
3 / 120
Mapam Labor Zionism
Democratic socialism		 מפם Yair Tzaban 2.5%
3 / 120
 no longer existed[c]
New Liberal Party Liberalism —[d] Yitzhak Moda'i — did not exist[e]
3 / 120
Tzomet National conservatism
Agrarianism		 ץ Rafael Eitan 2.0%
2 / 120
2 / 120
Moledet Ultranationalism ט Rehavam Ze'evi 1.9%
2 / 120
2 / 120
Shinui Liberalism
Centrism		 הן Amnon Rubinstein 1.7%
2 / 120
 no longer existed[c]
Degel HaTorah Religious conservatism עץ Avraham Ravitz 1.5%
2 / 120
2 / 120
PLFP Palestinian nationalism[8] פ Mohammed Miari 1.5%
1 / 120
1 / 120
Mada Arab interests עם Abdulwahab Darawshe 1.2%
1 / 120
1 / 120
Moria Ultra-Orthodox interest — Yitzhak Peretz — did not exist[f]
1 / 120
Geulat Yisrael Mizrahi ultra-Orthodox interest —[g] Eliezer Mizrahi — did not exist[h]
1 / 120

Campaign period

Campaign slogans

Party or alliance Original slogan[9] English translation
Likud "הליכוד-זה נכון!" "Likud - that's right!"
Labor "ישראל מחכה לרבין" "Israel is waiting for Rabin"
Meretz "ממשלה עם מרצ, הכוח לעשות את השינוי." "A government with Meretz [vigor], the power to make the change [Shinui]"
Mafdal "המפד"ל לימינך" "Mafdal stands by you [lit. to your right]"
UTJ "כולנו עם ג'" "We are all with God"
Hadash "שמאל זה חד"ש" "The left is Hadash"
Tzomet "ישראל בטוחה בצומת" "Israel is safe with Tzomet"
Tehiya "התחייה-יש ימין אמין!" "Tehiya - there is a reliable right!"

Opinion polls

The Israel Broadcasting Authority separated the parties into two blocs:

  • Left-wing:
    • Jewish: Alignment, Meretz (Ratz, Mapam, Shinui)
    • Arab: Hadash, PLP, Mada
  • Right-wing:
    • Secular: Likud, Tehiya, Tzomet, Moledet
    • Religious: UTJ, Shas, Degel HaTorah

Seat projections

Note: Political blocs do not necessarily determine the exact makeup of post-election coalitions.

Date Poll client Likud Alignment/Labor Meretz Tehiya Tzomet Moledet Hadash PLP Mada Shas Mafdal UTJ Others Lead Left Right Lead
Ratz Mapam Shinui Agudat Yisrael Degel
Final results 32 44 12 0 8 3 3 0 2 6 6 4 0 12 61 59 2
Exit poll on Channel 1 33 47 13 0 6 3 2 0 2 5 5 4 0 14 64 56 8
19 June 1992 Hadashot[10] 38 40 11 3 5 4 6 4 4 5 0 2 57 63 6
14 June 1992 Hadashot[10] 36 41 11 4 5 4 6 4 4 4 0 5 58 62 4
8 June 1992 Hadashot[11] 34 43 11 11 6 15 0 9 60 60 Tie
1 June 1992 Hadashot[10] 33 45 10 4 4 3 6 4 5 6 0 12 61 59 2
'mid-late' May 1992 Hadashot[12] 35 42 9 3 4 5 6 4 5 7 1 7 57 62 5
15 May 1992 Hadashot[11] 32 46 9 11 6 14 0 14 63 57 6
'early' May 1992 Hadashot[12] 33 43 9 3 6 3 6 5 4 7 1 10 58 61 3
'late' April 1992 Hadashot[12] 31 46 9 3 5 4 6 5 4 6 0 15 61 59 2
February 1992 Hadashot[13] 35 36 15 4 4 4 6 4 5 5 2 0 1 57 63 6
January 1992 Hadashot[13] 35 32 15 3 5 5 6 5 6 6 2 0 3 53 67 14
November 1991 Hadashot[13] 44 29 15 4 4 3 6 4 4 6 1 0 15 50 70 20
4-12 November 1991[14] Smith Research Institute[i] 41 26 9 2 N/A 3 4 4 5 2 1 N/A N/A N/A N/A 23 14 N/A N/A N/A
6 September 1991[16] Smith Research Institute 41 29 9 2 3 4 4 5 N/A N/A N/A N/A N/A N/A N/A 23 12 N/A N/A N/A
August 1991 Hadashot[13] 38 33 12 4 4 5 6 5 5 6 2 0 5 51 69 18
31 July 1991 Ma'ariv[17] 32 30 10 11 N/A N/A N/A 16 9 2 N/A N/A N/A
January 1990 Hadashot[18] 38 33 7 4 1 5 3 4 6 6 5 6 2 0 5 51 69 18
December 1989 Hadashot[18] 39 34 7 4 1 5 3 4 6 5 5 5 2 0 5 52 68 16
November 1989 Hadashot[18] 40 32 7 4 1 4 4 5 6 5 5 5 2 0 8 50 70 20
Outgoing Knesset 38 38 10 3 2 2 4 1 1 5 5 4 2 2 0 56 64 6
1988 results 40 39 5 3 2 3 2 2 4 1 1 6 5 5 2 0 5 56 64 6


Results

The Labor Party chairman Yitzhak Rabin. After winning the 1992 elections, Rabin managed to form the first Labor-led government in 6 years, supported by a coalition with Meretz, a left-wing party, and Shas, a Mizrahi ultra-orthodox religious party.
PartyVotes%Seats+/–
Labor Party906,81034.6544+5
Likud651,22924.8932−8
Meretz250,6679.5812+2
Tzomet166,3666.368+6
National Religious Party129,6634.956+1
Shas129,3474.9460
United Torah Judaism86,1673.294−3
Hadash62,5462.393−1
Moledet62,2692.383+1
Arab Democratic Party40,7881.562+1
Tehiya31,9571.220−3
Progressive List for Peace24,1810.920−1
New Liberal Party16,6690.640New
Geulat Yisrael12,8510.490New
Da11,6970.450New
Pensioners, Immigrants and Senior Citizens8,3270.320New
Movement of Mortgage Victims, the Homeless and Veterans5,9620.2300
Pikanti3,7500.140New
Torah VeAretz3,7080.140New
On Wheels3,3550.130New
Women's Party2,8860.110New
Hatikva2,0530.080New
Natural Law Party1,7340.070New
Tali1,3360.050New
Tzipor5230.020New
Total2,616,841100.001200
Valid votes2,616,84199.20
Invalid/blank votes21,1020.80
Total votes2,637,943100.00
Registered voters/turnout3,409,01577.38
Source: IDI, Nohlen et al.

Aftermath

Labor's Yitzhak Rabin formed the twenty-fifth government on 13 July 1992, including Meretz and Shas in his coalition, which had 17 ministers. Hadash and the Arab Democratic Party also supported the government despite not being coalition members. Shas left the coalition in September 1993, and Yiud joined in January 1995.

Coverage of the election night dubbed Labor's victory another 'Mahapach' (Hebrew: מהפך, lit. 'upheaval'), a term used to describe the Likud's first victory in 1977. The election marked a new age in Israeli politics in other senses. Political parties that had been mainstays in the Knesset in the 1980s were eliminated and subsequently disappeared. The Progressive List for Peace suffered a second mass exodus of members after 1992, with some eventually forming the Balad party. Tehiya, who were riding a polling surge in the mid-1980s, blamed its loss on 'personality-driven' parties on the right, with the leader Geulah Cohen singling out Tehiya's former ally Tzomet.[19] Tehiya would have won a seat if the election threshold was not raised to 1.5%, a policy that the party ironically supported.[20] The party disappeared.

Tzomet had a brief period of success, with its leader Rafael "Raful" Eitan claiming he was ready to negotiate with both left and right blocs, due to his party's ideologies of both secularism (which had been Meretz's main campaign point) and nationalism.[21] His image as a veteran was well respected,[22] but the MKs he brought with him were inexperienced and did not follow his party line, with many raising allegations that Raful was behaving 'tyrannically'. By the end of the Knesset term, Tzomet only had two MKs out of its original eight.[23]

The Knesset term saw several defections; two MKs left the Labor Party to establish the Third Way, whilst Nava Arad also left the party. Two MKs left Likud to establish Gesher, whilst Efraim Gur also left the party. Three MKs left Tzomet to establish Yiud; one MK then left Yiud to establish Atid. Yosef Azran left Shas. One MK left Moledet to establish Yamin Yisrael, whilst Yosef Ba-Gad also left the party to sit as in independent. United Torah Judaism split into Agudat Yisrael (two seats) and Degel HaTorah (two seats), but it would reunify in time for the next election.

Rabin's government advanced the peace process to unprecedented levels; the Oslo Accords were signed with Yasser Arafat's PLO in 1993 and the Israel–Jordan peace treaty in 1994. The government's willingness to make peace with Syria and concede the Golan Heights led to Avigdor Kahalani and Emanuel Zisman leaving the party to form the Third Way.

The government also continued sweeping reforms of the previously socialised economy, which had been set up by Labour's forerunners. Measures were enacted to privatise more public assets and to attract foreign capital. Meanwhile, a new national health insurance was introduced, ending the old Histadrut-dominated insurance system. Healthcare and education spending were increased.[24][25][26][27]

After Rabin's assassination on 4 November 1995, Shimon Peres took over as Prime Minister and formed a new government on 22 November 1995. His coalition was the same as before; Labor, Meretz and Yiud. Peres called early elections in 1996 in order to seek a mandate to continue the peace process,[28] in which he lost.

See also

Notes

  1. ↑ The Israeli Labor Party faction was originally the Alignment faction, but by the time of the 1988 elections, the Alignment electoral alliance had no other member parties other than Labor itself. The parliamentary faction was renamed to reflect this on 7 October 1991.
  2. ↑ Would use מרצ as its symbol in the 1992 elections
  3. 1 2 3 4 On 9 March 1992, Ratz, Mapam, and Shinui agreed to run on a common list in the 1992 elections. To ensure this, their respective parliamentary factions all merged into one on the same day.
  4. ↑ Would use קן as its symbol in the 1992 elections
  5. ↑ The New Liberal Party was formed on 15 March 1990 by five Likud defectors, formerly members of the (old) Liberal Party, who were dissatisifed with the Likud's transformation from an electoral alliance between Herut and the Liberal Party into a unitary party. Two of them, Yosef Goldberg and Avraham Sharir, later defected back to the Likud.
  6. ↑ Yitzhak Peretz was elected as an MK for Shas, but defected to form his own faction on 25 December 1990. In the 1992 elections, he ran on the Agudat Yisrael list.
  7. ↑ Would use קל as its symbol in the 1992 elections
  8. ↑ Eliezer Mizrahi was elected as an MK for Agudat Yisrael, but defected to form his own faction in 1990.
  9. ↑ Intentions given in percentages. Only Jewish voters were surveyed, and the calculation of seats assumes the Arab turnout and vote pattern was the same as 1988,[15] and that surplus vote agreements were signed between Labor and Ratz-Mapam, with those two constituting an internal surplus agremeent, Likud and Tzomet, and Tehiya and Moledet, the latter two being the cases in the election. This calculation assumes that Arab turnout equates to 10% of all votes, as was the case in 1988, and asides from the results indicated in the poll, Hadash would win 5 seats thanks to Arab voters, Labor and the PLP 2 each, and Ratz and Likud 1 each. It also assumes that Mada wins 1.01% of votes and fails to cross the threshold.

References

  1. ↑ "The 1992 Knesset Elections Revisited" Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs
  2. ↑ Dieter Nohlen, Florian Grotz & Christof Hartmann (2001) Elections in Asia: A data handbook, Volume I, p. 128 ISBN 0-19-924958-X
  3. ↑ "Twelfth Knesset". Knesset. Retrieved 21 June 2015.
  4. ↑ "Knesset Election Law 1991". www.knesset.gov.il. Retrieved 2026-04-07.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  5. ↑ "General details of Mapai's agreement". Ma'ariv. 10 January 1954.
  6. ↑ Reich, Bernard; Dropkin, Noah; Wurmser, Meyrav (1993). "Soviet Jewish Immigration and the 1992 Israeli Knesset Elections". Middle East Journal. 47 (3): 464–478. ISSN 0026-3141.
  7. ↑ Reich, Bernard (1991). "The Impact of the Soviet Jewish Vote on the Israeli Knesset Election" (PDF). apps.dtic.mil. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2025-02-02. Retrieved 2026-04-07.
  8. ↑ Haidar, Aziz (2018). Sabbagh-Khoury, Areej (ed.). The Nationalist Progressive Movement. The Palestinians in Israel Readings in History, Politics and Society. Vol. 2. Mada al-Carmel.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: date and year (link)
  9. ↑ "סיסמאות בפוליטיקה הישראלית". Hebrew Wikiquote. Retrieved 28 December 2025.
  10. 1 2 3 "Survey summary table". Hadashot. 19 June 1992.
  11. 1 2 "The pendulum is swinging to the right". Hadashot. 12 June 1992.
  12. 1 2 3 "Polls - the gap is closing". Hadashot. 5 June 1992.
  13. 1 2 3 4 "Polls". Hadashot. 13 March 1992.
  14. ↑ "Low public support for the Labor Party". Hadashot. 14 November 1992.
  15. ↑ "חדשות, מספר 2529, 19 יוני 1992" [Hadashot, Issue No. 2529, June 19, 1992]. www.nli.org.il (in Hebrew).
  16. ↑ "Right rose by 44%". Hadashot. 6 September 1991.
  17. ↑ "Losses for Likud and Labor". Ma'ariv. 31 July 1991.
  18. 1 2 3 "Surveys". Hadashot. 14 January 1990.
  19. ↑ "MK Neeman: Today we are paying". Hadashot. 24 June 1992.
  20. ↑ "Knesset Election Law 1991". www.knesset.gov.il. Retrieved 2026-04-07.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  21. ↑ Barzilai, Amnon (24 June 1992). "Don't rule out a broad coalition". Hadashot.
  22. ↑ Sandler, Shmuel (1995). Israel at the polls, 1992. Rowman & Littlefield. pp. 87–88.
  23. ↑ "Mergers and Splits Among Parliamentary Groups". Knesset. Retrieved 21 June 2015.
  24. ↑ Asa-El, Amotz (4 November 2015). "Yitzhak Rabin's little-known economic legacy".
  25. ↑ "Be Careful What You Privatize". Haaretz. 30 August 2015. Archived from the original on 5 September 2018.
  26. ↑ "The Bottom Line / When the Horses Are Far, Far Away". Haaretz. 26 September 2001. Archived from the original on 5 September 2018.
  27. ↑ "Silicon Israel". 23 December 2015.
  28. ↑ "Memory of Rabin likely to influence Israeli elections" CNN, 5 February 1996
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