A graphic posted by Benjamin Netanyahu on X on October 29, 2026, showing Ahmad Tibi under the Likud logo and the Hebrew question "Why did Ahmad Tibi visit Qatar four days before the elections?" Photo: @netanyahu via X
Israel's election chief has asked the Shin Bet to probe suspected foreign funding of the October 27 election, with Hebrew media reporting that Qatar is suspected of trying to sway Arab voters.
In a letter to Shin Bet Director David Zini dated Wednesday and revealed on Thursday, Supreme Court Justice Noam Sohlberg, who chairs the committee, wrote that "serious suspicions have been brought to my attention regarding improper influence on the elections, exerted through funding provided by foreign entities acting against Israeli interests," according to The Times of Israel. He said he could not attest to the substance of the suspicions, but because they involved foreign entities there was an obligation to investigate them thoroughly, and he asked to see any findings within a week.
Channel 12 and Ynet reported that the information had come to Sohlberg from the Shin Bet itself. According to Hebrew media reports cited by The Times of Israel, Qatar is suspected of sending significant funds to Arab organizations to raise turnout and influence voting, through channels that Channel 12 said resembled those used to move money for terrorism in the past. "This is an investigation opened in the past two weeks based on solid intelligence information," an unnamed security official told the public broadcaster Kan. Some reports also mentioned Turkey, but no official has named any country on the record.
Qatar rejected the reports quickly, calling it "ridiculous and dangerous" to suggest that Doha had played any role in alleged election fraud in Israel, The Times of Israel reported, and later said in an official statement that it denied interfering in Israel's elections, Globes reported.
The Shin Bet later said in an official statement that the investigation is narrowly focused and is not meant to cast blame on an entire community, Calcalist reported. A Central Elections Committee source told The Jerusalem Post that the inquiry would not delay the final results or stop President Isaac Herzog from choosing a party leader to try to form a government. Asked whether it could lead to a new election, the source said it was "far too early for such a question."
The timing has turned an already tense count into a crisis over legitimacy. After the count of the double envelopes ended on Thursday, results released by the Central Elections Committee gave the bloc supporting Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu 53 seats in the 120-seat Knesset, the Zionist opposition 48, and the two mainly Arab parties, Ra'am and the Joint List, a record 19 seats between them. That leaves neither camp near the 61 seats needed to govern and puts the Arab parties in a possible kingmaker position. Likud has 27 seats and the Yashar party of former army chief Gadi Eisenkot, which leads the opposition, has 21. The committee said those figures are not yet official and that, after a further integrity check, official results will be published on Wednesday, Calcalist reported.
Likud, which had already claimed on election night that the vote was "stolen by Arab parties," seized on the letter. It called the affair "Ra'amgate" and warned of an attempted "Islamization of Israel," saying that "no Zionist party should cooperate with Ra'am and the Joint List." On X, Netanyahu himself posted a graphic of the Joint List lawmaker Ahmad Tibi under the Likud logo with the question "Why did Ahmad Tibi visit Qatar four days before the elections?" Some Israeli accounts went further. The account @Tsahi48 wrote that if there is evidence of widespread vote buying, the election should be rerun "in every polling station that was affected," which it said would mean most stations in Arab communities.
Ra'am's leader Mansour Abbas welcomed the investigation in a statement shared on Thursday by the account @PalMediaX, saying the party supports protecting the integrity of the elections and the rule of law. "We have no connection to the case mentioned and we will cooperate with the authorities to show the truth," he said, according to Anadolu Agency's Arabic service (@aa_arabic). Tibi answered Netanyahu directly. In a reply quoted by the Arabic account @tamerqdh, he said he had told Al Jazeera in Doha that "we very much want to bring you down," and added that "the only party that received Qatari money, according to the Israel Police, is your office." The Joint List accused Netanyahu of trying to steal the election and of inciting against Arab citizens.
The police gave a more cautious picture. Before the letter became public, a police source told Israeli media that election day had "passed with very few irregular incidents concerning the integrity of the election, even when compared to previous elections," and that there was "no investigative or intelligence based supporting evidence" for Likud's fraud claims, The Times of Israel reported. Police arrested three Ra'am activists on election day on suspicion of bribery and four more on Thursday morning. It was not clear whether those arrests are connected to the wider Shin Bet inquiry, and Ra'am has denied the bribery claims. Police Commissioner Danny Levy said every complaint "will be examined and investigated thoroughly and impartially." The director of the elections committee said on Thursday that claims of widespread fraud appeared baseless and that the vote was conducted lawfully.
Opposition leaders backed an investigation but warned against using it to change the result. "Political actors must not be allowed to exploit the situation to influence the date of the swearing-in of the 26th Knesset," Eisenkot said. The new Knesset is expected to be sworn in on November 10. According to the Hebrew news account @HadashotIsrael, Zini briefed both Netanyahu and Eisenkot, and President Isaac Herzog called for a full investigation.
There is an awkward detail in the background. Only two days earlier, on election day, Zini had said that "it can be confidently stated to the citizens of Israel that the elections are monitored and conducted in a proper and inspiring manner," The Times of Israel recalled.