Israeli elections too close to call: exit polls
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E-mail Xinhua, March 18, 2015
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's Likud tied with the opposition center-left Zionist Union led by Isaac Herzog in Tuesday's Israeli parliamentary elections, with a slight advantage for the former, exit polls showed.
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Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (R) casts his ballot at a polling station during the parliamentary election in Jerusalem, on March 17, 2015. Israel held parliamentary election on Tuesday. [Photo/Xinhua] |
The Zionist Union and the Likud are predicted to win 27 seats respectively in the 120-member parliament, according to the exit polls conducted by Israel's Channel 1 and Channel 10.
Another exit poll, conducted by Channel 2, gave the Likud one seat lead over the center-left Zionist Union, with the former winning 28 seats.
The biggest surprise of the election was the Join List, an unprecedented coalition of Israel's Arab parties, which is poised to be the third largest party in the parliament with 12 to 13 seats, according to the exit polls.
The alliance was formed in January to unite the usually-squabbling small Arab parties after the threshold to enter the parliament was raised from two percent to 3.25 percent in early 2014.
The center Yesh Atid party led by former Finance Minister Yair Lapid came in fourth with 11 to 12 seats.
The results also showed that the dovish bloc narrowly leads the hawkish bloc, with 56 to 57 seats for the center-left camp and 54 seats for the right-wing and ultra-Orthodox parties. The centrist Kulanu party, headed by Moshe Kahlon who is not committed to either blocs, won ten seats.
The results, however, may change as vote counting is continuing throughout the night. Official results are expected to be announced early Wednesday morning.
In the polls, 15,000 Israelis were interviewed out of 5.88 million eligible voters outside polling posts across the country. The results were released right after the polls closed at 10 p.m. (2000 GMT).
In all, 24 parties ran in the elections and ten garnered the required 3.25 percent of the votes to enter the Knesset.
Under Israel's proportional representation system, voters vote for parties rather than for individual candidates. The prime minister would be the one who could form a wide and stable coalition of at least 61 members, not necessarily the one whose party won the majority of the votes.
Netanyahu, whose Likud had trailed the Zionist Union in opinion polls in recent weeks, has claimed victory.
"Against all odds, a great victory for the Likud, for the nationalist camp led by the Likud, and for the people of Israel," Netanyahu wrote on his Facebook page.
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