The swirl of polls surrounding Israeli elections, especially the Oct. 27 exit polls that proved woefully inaccurate, exposes a problem beyond sampling quality or pollsters’ professionalism. Polls are limited tools, but the greater problem often lies with their readers: the public, politicians, and commentators who turn every numerical shift into a historic verdict.
We mistake snapshots for forecasts and estimates for results, forgetting that behind the numbers are people with identities, memories, hopes and loyalties. We ask numbers to explain society instead of understanding society to interpret the numbers.
There is a troubling gap between our emphasis on mathematics education and our consumption of quantitative information. Students learn probability and statistics, yet political debate treats numbers on a screen as certainty.
What does a six-seat gap between blocs mean when a poll reports a margin of error of roughly four percentage points? Before declaring victory, we must ask what that margin covers, how seats were calculated, how parties near the electoral threshold affect projections and how undecided voters are allocated.
Percentage-point margins cannot automatically become parliamentary seats. Yet television offers graphics, arrows, winners and losers. Uncertainty disappears, replaced by political narrative.
My argument is not against mathematics, but against expecting it to replace social understanding. The social sciences provide the framework for the exact sciences; not as a hierarchy of prestige, but as an order of inquiry: understand the reality first, then determine how to measure it.
Voting expresses more than calculated interests. It reflects loyalty, belonging and visions of a shared future. Emotion is not necessarily irrational; it can express what matters most.
We must ask not only whom people support, but why, how firmly and what will motivate them to vote. Without context, accurate measurement can yield little understanding.
Israeli politics, in my view, cannot be understood without its national dimension. Israel is the Jewish people’s national home. For many citizens, security, sovereignty, continuity and identity are not background issues. They are the debate itself.
Leadership must build broad Jewish agreement around that home’s future while protecting non-Jewish citizens’ civil rights. Temporary majorities and coalition engineering cannot replace national partnership or an understanding of voters.
The controversy surrounding Shlomo Filber, a pollster for right-wing television channels, raises a legitimate question: Do polling models adequately account for national identity, institutional trust and feelings of representation?
I do not know Filber’s model well enough to know if it is superior to others. This question requires investigation, not assumptions. Polls are not accurate because they flatter our worldview, nor inaccurate because they disappoint us. Critics of the media establishment must meet the standards they demand.
I value Channel 14 and explicitly national media because they offer perspectives some citizens feel are underrepresented elsewhere. Likewise, the groups Habithonistim and Im Tirtzu bring national perspectives into public debate, openly seeking influence.
That does not exempt them from scrutiny. National media must verify facts, ask difficult questions and criticize governments they support. Patriotism does not require obedience. Conversely, opposing a government confers no monopoly on professionalism, democracy or truth.
Since Oct. 7, 2023, I have considered a public voice supporting resolve, legitimate force and sovereignty particularly important. We cannot prove what would have happened without it; we need only recognize that democratic debate requires this perspective alongside those questioning it.
Ultimately, the test is not whether polls favor our camp or commentators echo our preferences. It is whether we distinguish evidence from interpretation, forecasts from wishful thinking and substantive criticism from attempts to shape perceptions.
The essential word is not statistics, but meaning. Numbers tell us how many; they cannot relieve us of asking why or to what end.
Have the leaders of the left understood the national story—or have they traded it for the next poll? That question reaches beyond polling accuracy to the purpose of political leadership itself: understanding the people whose future it seeks to shape.
