Former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s party, Likud, won the country’s elections on Wednesday, according to exit polls.
Benjamin Netanyahu’s party received the most votes and, with the bloc of right-wing and religious parties backing it, will have between 61 and 62 seats, enough to form a government, according to polls.
The anti-Netanyahu bloc, led by current acting head of government Yair Lapid, won 54-55 seats in parliament, according to the first polls released after the polls closed.
The far-right alliance of Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben Gvir came third with 14 seats, almost alongside the centre-right Benny Gantz (11-13 seats).
Unlike previous elections, the Israeli Arab parties were dispersed into three lists: Raam (moderate Islamist), Hadash-Taal (secular) and Balad (nationalist).
Mansour Abbas’s Raam party, which had supported Yair Lapid’s coalition, won five seats, according to polls, giving Hadash-Taal four seats and Balad none.
This was the fifth legislative election in three and a half years in Israel, a politically divided country struggling to build or maintain coalitions.
Source: TSF
