Benny Gantz, the main challenger to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the country’s general election, called for a broad unity government early on Wednesday as exit surveys showed a tight race.
“We will act to form a broad unity government that will express the will of the people,” Mr Gantz told supporters at a post-election rally in Tel Aviv.
However he cautioned that he was still waiting for final results.
“We will begin negotiations and I will speak with everyone,” Gantz said. “I call on my rivals to join me, leave the debates aside and act together for a better and just society for all Israeli citizens.” It was his first public comment since polls closed in Tuesday’s elections, Israel’s second in five months.
Three separate exit polls showed Mr Netanyahu’s right-wing Likud and Mr Gantz’s centrist Blue and White alliance with between 30 and 32 parliament seats each out of 120.
Ex-defence minister Avigdor Lieberman’s nationalist Yisrael Beitenu party, which could play a kingmaker role, could win between eight and nine seats, according to the polls.
Addressing his supporters late Tuesday, a jubilant Mr Lieberman said he saw only “one option:” a broad, secular coalition with both Blue and White and Likud. “We’ve always said that a unity government is only possible in emergency situations. And I tell you and I tell every citizen today watching us on television: the situation, both security-wise and economically, are emergency situations,” he said. “The country, therefore, requires a broad government.”
Read the article in The Australian (AFP, agencies).