Jerusalem: Despite his legal troubles, Benjamin Netanyahu led his Likud party to an election triumph in Israel, despite getting the same number of seats as his main challenger, a former army chief. The right-wing prime minister was asked to form the next governing coalition by the Israeli president because he was more able to attract a plethora of smaller right-wing or strictly Orthodox parties to join him.
Although Israel’s attorney-general has recommended that Netanyahu be indicted on three corruption charges, the Israeli public did not turn their back on him, in part because of recent decisions by the Trump White House. The US has moved its embassy to Jerusalem, recognised the Golan Heights as Israeli sovereign territory, cut Palestinian funding and withdrawn from the Iran nuclear deal signed under Barack Obama. All of these were portrayed as diplomatic triumphs by Netanyahu.
His challenger had been a merged group called Blue and White, led by Lt. Gen. Benny Gantz, a former Chief of Staff for the Israel Defence Forces, and Yair Lapid, an enigmatic former TV presenter. Two other former IDF chiefs completed the new group’s leadership line-up.
The Israeli parliament, called the Knesset, is a 120-seat chamber, meaning a governing coalition must control at least 61 seats. Both Likud and Blue and White won 35 seats each.
Strictly Orthodox parties won 16 seats but said they would not sit with Blue and White because Lapid wants to end the Orthodox exemption from military service. Three other right-wing parties won 14 seats combined. Two had already said they would serve under Netanyahu.
One of the striking results from the election was the dramatic fall from grace of the left-wing Labor Party, which founded the State of Israel and formed the rump of a strong centre-left opposition in recent years, but landed only six seats this time.
Arab parties won ten seats. Ahead of Israel’s last election in 2015, Israel’s main Arab parties merged in a combined Joint List headed by the respected lawyer Ayman Odeh, winning 13 seats, but splintered ahead of this year’s vote, leaving only two parties – Hadash-Ta’al and Balad – with enough votes to make the cut.
Before the election, Netanyahu appealed to right-wing voters by promising to annex large parts of the West Bank, an announcement that drew no public condemnation from Trump. Analysts in Israel say Netanyahu is unlikely to follow-through with this, however, given the damage to Israel’s reputation that it would cause.
