June 12, 2021
By BEN SALES
(JTA) — When Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claims that his rivals are perpetrating the “greatest electoral fraud in the history of the country,” he’s not actually talking about voter fraud or negating a peaceful transfer of power, his Likud party said.
In a series of tweets in English Thursday, Likud sought to dispel the idea that Netanyahu was casting doubt on the actual results of the...
June 07, 2021
By BEN SALES
(JTA) — As Benjamin Netanyahu makes a last-ditch attempt to stay in power, even with a rival coalition set to take office, U.S. journalists and scholars are offering a dire comparison: Jan. 6.
In Israel, the political turmoil now seems eerily similar to what was happening in America prior to the insurrection at the Capitol that day.
Like Donald Trump, Netanyahu is trying to foil a democratic...
June 02, 2021
By DAVID ISSAC
(JNS.org) – Yesh Atid Party head Yair Lapid and Yamina Party head Naftali Bennett announced on Wednesday that they have secured an agreement to form Israel’s next government, thereby likely ending the 12-year consecutive term of Benjamin Netanyahu as the country’s prime minister.
The new government will be unprecedented in its composition, consisting of seven parties spanning the entire Israeli political spectrum, plus the backing of...
June 02, 2021
By BEN SALES
(JERUSALEM) — Benjamin Netanyahu will no longer be Israel’s prime minister, as his political opponents announced Wednesday night that they have formed a coalition that will replace him, pending a vote in Israel’s parliament.
The new coalition, dubbed the “change bloc,” is an ideologically broad alliance that spans the Israeli political right, center and left. For the first time in Israeli history, it will include an Arab-Israeli...
June 02, 2021
(JERUSALEM) – Issac Herzog, the chairman of The Jewish Agency for Israel was elected on Wednesday by the Knesset as the eleventh president of Israel.
A former government minister and past Leader of the Opposition, Herzog defeated Miriam Peretz in a secret ballot conducted in the Knesset. Herzog received 87 votes for president, while Peretz garnered 27. Herzog follows President Reuven Rivlin, whose term of office expires in July.
Herzog...
May 30, 2021
By RON KAMPEAS
(JTA) — Naftali Bennett, the right-wing leader of an ultranationalist party, accepted an offer from centrist Yair Lapid to lead a new Israeli government, which if the agreement holds would oust Benjamin Netanyahu from power after a record 12 years as prime minister.
“I will do whatever I can to establish a national unity government with my friend Yair Lapid, to save the country from chaos and...
April 06, 2021
By BEN SALES
(JTA) — Benjamin Netanyahu has again been chosen to lead Israel’s next government following an election that did not deliver a majority to the prime minister or his rivals.
Netanyahu, who has served as prime minister for more than a decade, does not have a clear path to assembling a majority coalition in Israel’s 120-seat parliament, the Knesset. But he received the support of 52 lawmakers, more...
April 02, 2021
By BEN SALES
(JTA) — Following yet another Israeli election, voters are getting to know an unlikely kingmaker: Mansour Abbas, an Arab-Israeli lawmaker who might be the one to break Israel’s two-year political stalemate.
Abbas, head of the United Arab List political party, is not the kind of politician who usually wields power in the Jewish state. He’s an Islamist who has more in common ideologically with Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood...
March 24, 2021
By BEN SALES
(JTA) — On Tuesday night, after Israeli TV stations broadcast the first exit polls from the country’s elections, a rabbi who had just won a seat in parliament tweeted out a traditional blessing of thanks, called the “Shehechiyanu.”
“Blessed are you, Hashem, our God, ruler of the universe, who has kept us alive and sustained us and brought us to this day,” wrote the rabbi, Gilad Kariv....
March 23, 2021
(JNS.org) – Initial exit polls from Israel’s national election on Tuesday indicate that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, along with support from his right-wing bloc—if the Yamina Party is included—would have a narrow Knesset majority, giving the Israeli leader an unprecedented sixth term in office.
Exit polls show Netanyahu’s Likud winning 31 to 33 seats, with his wider right-wing bloc of around 53 to 54 seats. While this is short...
