More than 71% of Israel’s 6.5 million eligible voters, a 20-year high, cast their votes in Israel’s 1 November elections. This is the fifth Israeli election in less than four years; during that period, two shaky governments were formed, each of which lasted only a year.
According to the exit polls, former prime minister Benjamin (Bibi) Netanyahu is in a good position to reclaim the prime ministership. Like all four previous elections campaigns since 2019, 2022 was again a referendum on his eligibility to be Israel’s head of government.
Entangled in a legal battle after being indicted on charges of bribery, corruption and breach of trust – which he vehemently denies – Netanyahu is still popular among most right-wing voters. His supporters largely believe an organised campaign against him is being run by the legal and political elites, promoted by the media.
Netanyahu’s Likud party is set to win about 30 Knesset (parliament) seats, out of the total 120, thereby retaining its status as the biggest party in Israel.
Senior Likud members have been promising to reform the judicial system, reducing what they consider the judges’ disproportionate power to challenge the authority of elected parliamentarians. Some of the judicial reform laws being proposed, if passed, could either aid Netanyahu in his legal battle or annul the case against him entirely.
The “star” of the elections was extreme right-wing politician Itamar Ben Gvir. Ben Gvir achieved notoriety as a teenage activist for his role in the incitement in the mid-1990s against then-PM Yitzhak Rabin, shortly before Rabin was assassinated by another right-wing extremist.
Read the article by Dr Ran Porat in the Monash LENS.