Will Benjamin Netanyahu return to power? Will the centrist Yaïr Lapid keep his young title of prime minister? The Israelis vote this Tuesday the fifth legislative in less than four years and whose result keeps the country in suspense.
Polling stations open at 7 a.m. across the country and are due to close at 10 p.m. Then exit polls will drop, followed by the first official results that could keep the Jewish state on edge until the final count on Thursday, as that this choice seems uncertain.
For this proportional vote, the 6.8 million registered voters can choose between forty lists that are divided mainly into two camps: the one in favor of the return to power of the far-right Benjamin Netanyahu, tried for corruption in a series of businesses, and the wanting maintenance with the businesses of a young heterogeneous coalition led by the centrist Yaïr Lapid.
A very close vote
At 73, Benjamin Netanyahu, the longest-serving head of government in Israel’s history, is trying to muster a majority of 61 lawmakers out of 120 in parliament, with his allies from the ultra-Orthodox parties and the extreme right that has the wind against it. the candles of him.
In front of him, Yaïr Lapid, 58, prime minister since July, leader of the Yesh Atid party (“There is a future”) and leader of a unique coalition in the history of Israel because it brings together formations of the left, center, right and as an Arab party, he is trying to convince that the course given in recent months must be maintained.
This “coalition for change” led by Naftali Bennett and Yair Lapid ousted Benjamin Netanyahu from power in June 2021 before losing his majority in the chamber a year later, precipitating Tuesday’s election, the fifth since the spring of 2019 in a politically divided country that is struggling. to give birth to coalitions or to maintain them.
Proof of the environmental suspense, the latest polls credit Netanyahu’s “right-wing bloc” with 60 seats, one shy of the majority threshold, compared to 56 for Yair Lapid and his allies.
Source: BFM TV
