No clear winner has emerged from Israel’s election, with nearly 90 per cent of ballots counted and neither of the two main political blocs securing the 61 seats required to form a government.
The Israeli Central Elections Committee said it had counted more than five million votes by 9pm local time (19:00 GMT) on Wednesday, reports Al Jazeera.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s bloc is projected to win 53 seats in the 120-member Knesset, while the opposition alliance led by Gadi Eisenkot is expected to secure 48 seats.
Projections from Tuesday’s election also indicate that the Arab parties, the Joint List and Ra’am, could win a record combined total of 19 seats.
The final results could be announced as early as Thursday evening, although they are unlikely to produce a clear winner.
More than 500,000 special double-envelope ballots are yet to be counted, potentially altering the distribution of seats. These include votes from soldiers, diplomats and others who cast their ballots away from their registered polling stations.
The election, the first since the 7 October, 2023, attacks and the Gaza genocide, was widely viewed as a referendum on Netanyahu’s leadership.
The 77-year-old prime minister appears far from defeated, despite his bloc falling short of a clear majority.
Netanyahu will continue as caretaker prime minister until a new government takes office.
Israeli President Isaac Herzog will begin consultations with party leaders next week to discuss forming a new administration after the official results are released.
Herzog has called on all parties to avoid another election that could delay the formation of a government.
Coalition negotiations are a longstanding feature of Israeli politics, as no party has ever secured an outright majority in the country’s history.
Before the election, Eisenkot ruled out forming a minority government with Arab-led parties. Netanyahu also rejected the possibility.
With Netanyahu’s bloc projected to emerge as the largest, analysts expect him to seek a unity government that could include Eisenkot. However, such an arrangement remains uncertain.
In a post on X on Wednesday, Eisenkot said his opposition alliance was now concentrating on the “heavy task entrusted to us – bringing change to Israel and establishing a Zionist mobilisation government”.
“This is the will of the people who expressed no confidence in the government of October 7th and the shirking, and in the bloc of shirkers in general. A bloc that is at the low point of two decades.”
Amid record turnout among Arab voters, Netanyahu’s Likud party accused Arab parties of stealing the election.
“The elections in the State of Israel were stolen by Arab parties that support terrorism and the elimination of the Jewish state through serious criminal offences of bribery, threats, violence, forgeries, and the use of prohibited software to mobilise voters,” the party said in a statement.
“The Likud party is transferring to the police, the Shin Bet, and the Central Elections Committee hundreds of testimonies and pieces of evidence regarding election theft in many Arab polling stations,” it said.
The predominantly Arab Joint List alliance said preliminary figures indicated that Arab voter turnout had played a decisive role in preventing Netanyahu and his coalition from securing a parliamentary majority. However, it cautioned that the final results were still pending.
In a statement published late on Wednesday by Turkish news agency Anadolu, the alliance said voters had responded to incitement and intimidation through the ballot box, rejecting a “government of butchers” and its policies of home demolitions, racism and war crimes.
The Joint List said its electoral support reflected demands for political unity and the formation of a political force capable of defending Arab citizens’ rights without making concessions.
It pledged to work towards removing Netanyahu’s government and preventing its return, adding that it was ready to cooperate in efforts to establish an alternative administration.
Joint List leader Yousef Jabareen said the alliance could support an anti-Netanyahu government from outside parliament but would not join it.
