Netanyahu Wins Third Election Round

Third time's a charm: Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu succeeded in winning 60 seats for his bloc of right-wing and religious parties in Monday’s election and joined his advisors in song for Jerusalem. Full Story, Video

March 2, 2020 – 6 Adar 5780

Jerusalem Post reports:

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the longest-serving leader in the country’s history, is on the path to remain in office after his win in the unprecedented third consecutive election cycle within a single year.

Exit polls indicated that Netanyahu’s Likud party won 36-37 seats in Monday’s election, making it the largest political party and giving him the first chance to form a government and a coalition.

What will help him do so is are 60 seats for his bloc of right-wing and religious parties with Shas winning 8-9, UTJ (Yahadut Hatorah – Gimmel) 8 and Yamina 6-7 respectively.

The Blue and White party, led by Netanyahu’s head rival Benny Ganz, was downgraded to 33 seats, its ally Labor-Gesher-Meretz 6-7, the Arab Joint List 14-15 and Yisrael Beytenu led by Avigdor Leiberman 6-8.

Netanyahu needs one more seat to win a majority in the Knesset, according to the exit polls. He will most likely be courting a member from another party or perhaps a faction of a party to deflect and join him.

The numbers are expected to change overnight, the Jerusalem Post noted. The votes of soldiers, who tend to lean to the right, have not yet been counted and the Joint List tends to go down a seat when the soldiers’ votes are added.

Netanyahu tweeted “thank you” and a video clip showed him singing for Jerusalem with his wife Sara and campaign staff.

“The outright victory in the third election in under a year is expected to enable Netanyahu to quickly form a right-wing coalition after having headed a caretaker government since December 2018,” Gill Hoffman reported in the Post.

Sources in Likud said he would even try to get a government in place before his criminal trial begins on March 17.

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