The last votes that could change everything – Israel awaits count of 600,000 ‘double envelopes’

PELONI:  With less than 10% of the votes yet to be counted, the outlook is quite concerning.  Israel Beitenu has easily passed the threshold, and the National camp has only 53 seats based on votes currently counted.  The surge of Arab votes in this election has had its effect, and in the Jewish State, that is both inexplicable, damning and meaningful.

Large number of active-duty IDF reservists resulted approximately 600,000 absentee ballots

All Israel News Staff | Published: October 28, 2026

When the Central Elections Committee completes the count of ballots cast at polling stations across the country on Wednesday, Israel will have a clearer picture of the election results.

However, the final outcome will be determined by 600,000 “double envelopes,” whose count is only scheduled to begin after a short break on Wednesday afternoon and is expected to be completed the following day.

The double envelopes contain the absentee ballots cast by soldiers on active duty and reservists, who make up the overwhelming majority of voters using this method, as well as several thousand diplomats, police officers, prison staff, hospital patients and displaced residents.

This year, the large number of IDF reservists serving on active duty has contributed to a significant increase, with the Central Elections Committee estimating around 600,000 double-envelope ballots.

The Israeli military said on Wednesday that voter turnout among military personnel reached 79.9% – a 6.2% increase compared with the 2022 election.

Under the typical system, each voter places a paper ballot marked with a code representing a particular party inside an envelope and then drops it into the ballot box.

For absentee ballots, the sealed ballot envelope is placed inside a second envelope with the identifying information, which election officials use to ensure the voter has not voted twice.

Because each Knesset mandate is worth around 40,000 votes, these 600,000 final votes could be worth 13-15 mandates and have a significant impact.

In the past, the soldiers’ votes have leaned strongly toward the right, while containing almost no votes for the ultra-Orthodox or Arab parties, which send only small numbers of soldiers to serve in the IDF.

These additional votes typically boost Zionist parties while reducing the ultra-Orthodox and Arab parties’ share of the overall vote. In this election, those parties include United Torah Judaism (UTJ), Shas, Ra’am and the Joint List.

For example, during the last election in 2022, the regular votes suggested UTJ could win 8 seats and Avigdor Liberman’s Yisrael Beitenu party 5; but once the double envelopes were counted, UTJ dropped to 7 and Yisrael Beitenu rose to 5.

This election, i24 News pollster and Direct Polls Director Tzuriel Sharon, whose projections appear to have been the most accurate, believes the envelopes would favor the Netanyahu bloc and could add another mandate to his side.

Elad Naveh, head of the Central Elections Committee control center, told Ynet News on Wednesday morning, “Even if we have a very large number of double-envelope ballots, as we expect — more than half a million — their distribution is generally similar to the nationwide distribution. There are no significant deviations.”

Naveh said that the envelopes are first “cross-checked and verified to ensure that no one voted both at their assigned polling station and through a double envelope.”

“Then the ballots are assigned to election committees and the outer envelopes are opened. All of this happens before the actual count.”

He estimates the absentee ballot count will begin Wednesday evening and only be completed by Thursday evening, or stretch into Friday.

Even so, the counting process will not end there.

“Next week, on Sunday, Monday and Tuesday, as well as Friday, we will conduct an audit of polling stations,” Naveh said. “We will recount a sample of polling stations, stations where certain incidents occurred and those where discrepancies were found.”

“In the previous election, we recounted almost half of all polling stations,” he added. “We conduct checks upon checks upon checks to make sure the will of the voters is reflected in the results.”

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October 28, 2026 | Comments »

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