The leaders of Israel’s two main parties, the centrist and right-wing party, have both claimed victory in an early general election.
The governing centrist Kadima has 28 seats and the right-wing Likud opposition 27, election officials said.
Kadima’s Tzipi Livni told supporters she was ready to lead the country. But Likud’s Benjamin Netanyahu said the ‘nationalist camp’ had won.
Both need coalition partners. Ultra-nationalist Yisrael Beitenu came third.
The Labour party, had a dismissal performance by coming fourth, leaving a few, like Psychology professor Herba Alexander asking where is the left?
“I am by instinct a leftist but I think the leftists failed completely and it is time to recognise that we need really to be strong and somewhat aggressive in the way in which we live or we have no hope.”
The Kadima party seems to have won by a slim margin – a party which was doomed from the start but gained considerable in the polls with its three week attack on the Gaza strip.
According to the Guardian, under Israel’s proportional representation system no one party is likely to win a majority, meaning weeks of negotiation will now follow to form a coalition government.
Next week the Israeli president, Shimon Peres, will call on the leader of the party he thinks most likely to form a coalition, regardless of whether that is the largest party, and give him or her 42 days to complete the task.
So now, who will built a coalition?And if a (far) right-wing government is given the mandate where does it leave Obama? Even so, is a Centre-Left party credible?
We’ll wait.
