The support rate of Likud, Israel 's leading ruling party, is increasing, according to a poll released on Tuesday.

If general elections to the Knesset, Israeli parliament, were to be held today, Likud would win 32 seats, compared to 27 it received in last year's election, said the survey co-conducted by UK thinktank the Smith Institute and local news service Ynet.

Exactly one year after the general elections, the right-wing bloc still enjoys a strong and stable majority in the Knesset, according to poll carried out in this week.

Tzipi Livni's Kadima, the centrist party which has the most seats in the Israeli parliament currently, would lose two seats and go down from 28 to 26. While, Labor, the central-leftist party in the ruling bloc, suffered a big blow as only 37 percent of the people who supported it at the last election would do so again, according to the poll.

Though the ruling party is gaining popularity, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, also the chairman of Likud, was facing a slide in his overall public support for the first time in a year, another local survey said last week.

However, Netanyahu still represents a more popular choice among the Israeli public as prime minister, keeping the lead over his main rival Livni, a former foreign minister and the current opposition leader, according to the Ha'aretz-Dialog survey.

The pollster attributed the premier's waning popularity to the 10-month moratorium he announced in November on new construction projects in the West Bank settlements.

Most local political analysts believe that Netanyahu has done fairly well till now in maintaining his ruling bloc, consisting mostly right-wing parties besides the Labor, and he is cautious about doing any major compromise in the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, a move that might arouse complains and opposition from his rightist ally.

Seen as another effort to enhance the support for the right- wing parties, Netanyahu said on Monday that he will submit a proposal to enable Israeli citizens living abroad to vote in parliamentary elections. The plan was slammed by Tzipi Livni, who denounced it as "immoral."