Israeli Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu's Likud party finished first in Tuesday's Israeli parliamentary elections, with no guarantee of winning a majority of seats to form the next government, according to exit polls.
According to these polls by Israeli channels, his troops obtained between 31 and 33 seats out of the 120 in the Knesset (Parliament), followed by the Yesh Atid ("There is a future") party of centrist Yair Lapid credited with 16 with 18 seats.
“Citizens of Israel, thank you!
You gave a huge victory to the right and to Likud under my leadership.
(...) It is evident that an overwhelming majority of Israeli citizens are right-wing and want a right-wing, strong and stable government, ”Mr. Netanyahu tweeted.
Along with his right-wing allies, Benjamin Netanyahu would gain more support to form a governing coalition if Naftali Bennett, credited with 7-8 seats, joins him.
The latter, at the head of the radical right-wing Yamina party, is considered the “kingmaker” of this election.
He has not made it clear whether he supports an anti-Netanyahu or a pro-Netanyahu government, a figure whose management he shares but criticizes.
Carried by the vaccine
Partial official results will be released overnight and the election commission said it could announce the final results on Friday, just before Passover, which begins on Saturday.
Benjamin Netanyahu, accused of corruption in a series of cases and whose trial must continue after the elections, played his political survival in this poll, the fourth in two years.
The centrist party "Bleu-Blanc" of his ex-rival Benny Gantz, with whom he had come neck to neck in the last three elections, is credited with only seven to eight seats.
The Prime Minister had led his campaign by highlighting the intense vaccination against Covid-19 which allowed the government to administer two doses to nearly 50% of the population and to reopen sectors of the economy in recent weeks.
