HAIFA, Israel—Former Israeli Premier Benjamin Netanyahu is poised to return to power, claiming a “huge vote of confidence” from voters and declaring that his coalition of conservative parties is on the cusp of an election win.
“The people want a different way. They want security,” Netanyahu said. “They want power, not weakness. ... They want diplomatic wisdom, but with firmness.”
Election Results Update
As of Nov. 1 at 10 p.m. local time when polls closed, 4,843,023 Israelis had voted, or 71.3 percent of eligible voters—the highest since the 2015 election.The votes at the polls are hand counted, and there are no election machines at the polls.
As of Nov. 2 at 2:06 p.m. local time, 85.9 percent of the votes had been counted, and Netanyahu’s conservative Likud Party and its allies were on pace to control a majority in Parliament.
The final results are expected to be received on Nov. 3, but only on Nov. 9 will the official results be submitted to President Isaac Herzog by the chairman of the Central Elections Committee, Supreme Court Judge Yitzhak Amit.
Recent elections have produced a deadlock between Netanyahu’s Likud and a number of opposing parties, with neither side able to hold a majority since 2019.
A Profile of Netanyahu
After less than 18 months out of office, if preliminary counts hold, Israel’s longest-serving prime minister, who has dominated the country’s politics for more than a decade, is set to return.Netanyahu has pledged to build on the achievement of his last term in office, the Abraham Accords with the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain, which opened the way for a possible normalization of relations with other Arab countries.
Netanyahu has been flanked on the right in previous governments and still managed to normalize ties with Arab states in the Persian Gulf and, as a free-market champion, oversee impressive economic growth.
But he was also more willing to publicly confront the United States over Iran’s nuclear program than the outgoing government.
Israel–Lebanon Maritime Agreement
Israel and Lebanon signed a maritime agreement on Oct. 27 that settles a sea border between the two states, which don’t have diplomatic relations and have officially been in a state of war for decades.Nasrallah had made threats against Israeli gas infrastructure if Israel began to produce gas at the offshore Karish gas rig near the Israeli–Lebanon border and the agreement wasn’t finalized.
Lebanon’s caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati said on Nov. 2 that U.S. guarantees would protect a maritime border deal with Israel should Netanyahu win a majority in elections.
“We’re not afraid of a change in the authorities in Israel. Whether Netanyahu wins or someone else, no one can stand in the way of this [deal],” he said.
