Former Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu is the big winner of the legislative election on Tuesday, November 1, the final results of which were announced on Wednesday by the electoral commission. Next step: the delicate formation of a government.
Despite his corruption trial, Binyamin Netanyahu won with his allies from the ultra-Orthodox parties and the far-right Religious Zionism list 64 of the 120 Knesset mandates, three more than the majority threshold, announced this Thursday evening the electoral commission two days after the legislative elections. Shortly before, outgoing Prime Minister Yair Lapid, who had ousted him from power last year by setting up a motley coalition which has since imploded, contacted his rival to congratulate him on this victory.
According to the electoral commission, Benyamin Netanyahu’s “right bloc” won 64 seats – 32 for his Likud party, 18 for the two Orthodox parties and a record 14 for the far right. Centrist Lapid’s Yesh Atid (“There is a future”) party won 24 seats, its center-right ally Benny Gantz 12 seats, followed by 10 seats for two other parties and five for the Arab Raam party, which had also supported his coalition, for a total of 51 deputies. The Arab Hadash-Taal party won 5 deputies.
A balancing act
Benyamin Netanyahu will now have to tackle the formation of a government. On paper, a mere formality. But in fact, “Bibi” will have to carry out complicated negotiations, analyzes our correspondent in Jerusalem, Sami Boukhelifa. Because if he can count on the support of ultra-Orthodox clerics, he will also have to deal with the leaders of the extreme right, Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben Gvir. The two men have already claimed the Defense and Interior portfolios respectively.
Is Benyamin Netanyahu ready to grant sovereign ministries to the far right? This Israeli extreme right is the heir to a fanatical ideology, Kahanism, whose followers are considered a terrorist organization in the United States. Washington has already warned: the Israeli-American relationship “ has always been based on common interests, but also, importantly, on shared values “. If he wants to return to the head of the Jewish state, Benyamin Netanyahu will therefore have to start a difficult balancing act.
If successful, this government could become, according to analysts, the most right-wing in the country’s history. The allies of the winner of the legislative elections have indeed radical positions on many subjects, starting with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The far-right Religious Zionism party thus pleads for an annexation of the West Bank, Palestinian territory according to UN resolutions. ” The time has come to be the masters in our country “, launched his number two, the Jewish supremacist Itamar Ben Gvir on election night.
These parties also intend to change the face of Israel: to attack the separation of powers by placing the judicial system under the domination of politics, to make the country a state governed by religious rules, to reduce the rights of minorities, in particular the community LGBT+… Dropped from all sides since the start of his corruption trial, the ex-Prime Minister has weighed in to bring up his last allies and return to power. Even if it means going against his own convictions, he who represents a secular right.