Benjamin Netanyahu is campaigning on his wartime leadership and alliance with US president Donald Trump, who endorsed him and joined Israel's war on Iran. (EPA Images pic)JERUSALEM: Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu faces a fight for political survival in Israel's election on Tuesday, with voters weighing his leadership after the 2023 Hamas-led attacks, wars in Gaza and with Iran, and Israel's deepening international isolation.

Yet Netanyahu, Israel's longest-serving leader with 19 years in office, remains a formidable survivor, with nationalist politics increasingly entrenched and Israel's fragmented system potentially leaving him best placed to form a government.

Opinion polls show a close race between Netanyahu's Likud party and its right-wing allies and a rival alliance led by Gadi Eisenkot, a former military chief of staff and security hawk with backers on the right and in the centre.