Right-wing bloc led by Likud and joined by UTJ, Shas, Religious Zionist Party and Naftali Bennett's Yamina, receives 59.
Exit polls were mostly inconclusive throughout the dramatic post-election night. The three channels - 11, 12 and 13 - initially called a victory for Netanyahu's Likud assuming Bennett, who immediately said he would do what is right for the country, joins the coalition.
Central Elections Committee head Orly Ades said preliminary results of the normal polling stations would be announced later in the day. Only after that, the Central Elections Committee will begin counting some 450,000 double envelopes, which are ballots from hospitals, nursing homes, emissaries, soldiers, prisoners and special polling stations for returnees at Ben-Gurion International Airport and for the sick and quarantined from COVID-19.
Netanyahu declared that his Likud had won in a speech he delivered at the Jerusalem International Convention Center at 2:30 a.m. He vowed to avoid a fifth election and called on politicians across the spectrum to enter a government he intended to build immediately.
He said that he has more than a double digit margin, the largest margin between the first and second parties in decades. "Israel is the world champion of vaccines," Netanyahu said. "We brought millions of vaccines for everyone just like we made peace deals for everyone.""I don't disqualify anyone from sitting with me," he said, "because the state of Israel demands a stable government."
Hours earlier, Netanyahu declared on Twitter that he had won "a giant victory." Sources in Likud said Netanyahu would try to build a coalition as soon as possible, but Bennett's associates said they were "not in Netanyahu's pocket" and that joining his government was not a foregone conclusion.
Netanyahu called Yamina leader Naftali Bennett, who told him he was waiting for the final results and he would "act for the good of all the citizens of Israel." Netanyahu also called the other leaders in his political camp and asked them to join a strong, right-wing government.
Opposition leader Yair Lapid boasted that "Netanyahu doesn’t have 61 seats but the change bloc does," in a speech to activists of his Yesh Atid Party. He called parties in the anti-Netanyahu bloc and vowed to coordinate their next steps together.
The turnout of 67.2% was a drop of 4.3% since last March's election in which the turnout was 71.5% and the lowest of the four elections of the past two years.
In a speech to his party's activists, Sa'ar downplayed his defeat and asked to wait for final results. He vowed to not enter a Netanyahu-led government, though Likud officials said they would try to woo New Hope MKs.
According to the exit polls, the Likud won 30 seats on KAN and on Channel 12 and 31 on Channel 13. Shas won 9 on all three channels. UTJ won 6 on Channel 12 and 7 on Channel 13 and KAN. The Religious Zionist Party won 7 on Channel 12 and KAN, and Channel 13 gave it 6 seats. Yamina won 7 on all three channels.
Lapid led his party to 18 seats according to Channel 12 and KAN and 17 according to Channel 13. Gideon Sa'ar's New Hope Party won a disappointing 6 seats according to all three polls.
Yisrael Beytenu won 7 seats pm all three channels. Blue and White won 7 according to Channel 12 and 8 according to KAN and Channel 13. Labor won 7 according to Channel 13 and KAN and 8 according to N12. Meretz won 6 according to KAN and Channel 12 and 7 according to Channel 13.
After struggling throughout the campaign, Meretz easily crossed the 3.25% electoral threshold, according to the exit polls. The Joint List won nine seats on Channel 12 and KAN on Channel 13 and KAN.
Gantz thanked his supporters for demonstrating their confidence in him.
"Starting tomorrow, I'll do my best to unite the pro-change block," he said. "And if we are forced to face a fifth round of elections, I will vigilantly protect our democracy, rule of law and security, because Israel comes first."
The exit polls came following a tense day of infighting with both political camps. Yamina fought for seats with the Religious Zionist Party, while Gantz accused Lapid of sending out false statements about Blue and White and other satellite parties.
Sarah Ben-Nun and Eve Young contributed to this report.
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Democracy in Action: Your Guide to the 2021 Israeli Elections
While media tend to fixate on a set number of
agenda-driven issues when it comes to Israel, the resilience of the Jewish
state’s democracy is taken for granted. Israel’s parliamentary system is older
than those of half of the democracies in the world. In a region characterized
by authoritarian regimes, the persistence of Israel’s vibrant experiment in
democratic rule is no mere happenstance.
No doubt, Israeli democracy is a complicated
attempt at getting representative government right. But the quirks and
inconsistencies that define it are not unique. As Winston Churchill famously
said: “No one pretends that democracy is perfect or all-wise. Indeed it
has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except for
all those other forms that have been tried from time to time.”
So what makes Israel’s democracy tick? On the
eve of a fourth national election in less than two years, below are some
examples that highlight key elements related to the Jewish state’s political
system.
The State of Israel was established without a formal constitution, the development of which was outlined in the country’s Declaration of Independence. However, in 1992 the Israeli parliament, the Knesset, adopted two Basic Laws dealing with human rights. The Supreme Court has since utilized them as a platform for ensuring that the rights of all Israelis are upheld.
Rock the Vote: In total, there are around 6 million eligible voters in Israel. During the three last elections, voter turnout grew consistently, from 68.4 percent in April 2019 to 71.5 percent in the March 2020 election. Clearly, Israelis of every background are deeply concerned and care about their home. As a result, most citizens exercise their right to shape the country’s path forward.
Sky’s the Limit: Drones will be utilized by
the Central Elections Committee on Tuesday to monitor lines at 751 special
polling stations across the country that will be used exclusively by those
either infected with COVID-19 or who are in forced isolation. If the drones
detect that the lines are too long, voters will be sent to other polling
stations. In addition, vans and taxis will be taking the sick and quarantined
to vote.
First Time Voting: Early voting for Israeli diplomats and
staff at the Israeli missions abroad started earlier this month. Approximately
4,000 Israelis were given the opportunity to cast a ballot at more than 100 polling stations
erected at some 100 missions worldwide. For the first time
ever, votes were cast in Morocco, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates.
A Knesset of a 120 Stars? Over the last few years, the composition of the
Knesset has undergone an extreme makeover. Increasingly, former television
personalities and journalists and other famous faces have joined the Israeli political echelon.
For better or worse, this appears to be a trend towards personalizing Israeli
politics, whereby the familiarity and likeability of candidates can at times be
a greater defining factor than their party’s platform.
Israeli Democracy Ranks High: Freedom House’s 2019 Freedom in the World
report gave Israel 13 out of 16 points for
‘political pluralism and participation,’ a perfect score for ‘electoral
process,’ and 10 out of a possible 12 for ‘functioning of government.’
American Connection to Israel’s Declaration of
Independence: The 1776 US
Declaration of Independence served as a reference point for
the drafting of the Israeli Declaration of Independence in 1948. First drafted
by Mordechai Beham, the Jewish state’s founding document adopted the United
States’ original focus on human values, national identity, and belief in God.
Some of the Happiest Voters on Earth: Despite recent political uncertainty,
Israel ranked high on the World Happiness Report 2021. The survey
specifically measures the ability of a country and society to provide
citizens with, among other things, a sense of freedom – with respect to speech,
movement and action – and the feeling of belonging to a nation with which they
identify with and trust.
Most Unpredictable Election Ever? Even by Israeli standards, Tuesday’s election
is replete with unknowns, a
primary reason for it being so compelling. A record number of undecided voters;
an unprecedented number of parties teetering on the 3.25 percent electoral
threshold; the COVID-19 factor; and the possibility of election fatigue
together add up to a lot of uncertainty. The outcome is, at this point,
anyone’s guess.
That said, Israelis are most fortunate,
exercising their right to have their voices heard and help direct the course of
the Jewish state’s future.
On March 23, every Israeli will win.
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When it comes to reliability, The New York Times has become one of the most pathetic newspapers in the nation if one relies on them for accuracy etc. It is amazing how many formerly great companies/enterprises take their eye off the ball and suffer an ignominious decline or spiraling death, ie. Eastman Kodak, Polaroid, Packard, Hudson etc.
The Times is trying to gaslight you about the summer’s riots
We should have expected this: Nine months after the death of George Floyd triggered a massive wave of riots and looting, The New York Times has issued a lengthy report about what happened — and blamed it all on the police.
In a recent front-page story headlined, “In City After City, Police Mishandled Black Lives Matter Protests,” the paper predictably lays the entire blame on cops, rather than on radicals who wrecked commercial districts and caused at least 25 deaths and thousands of injuries.
In the heat of the crisis, mainstream outlets called the riots “protests.” It was an eye-wateringly brazen attempt at gaslighting, belied, in some cases, by reporters claiming the “protesters” were “mostly peaceful,” even as the cityscapes behind them were ablaze.
The same outlets, of course, had no trouble using the “r” word about the events of Jan. 6 on Capitol Hill. Indeed, they soon reframed the Trumpian hooligans’ riot in Washington as an “insurrection,” demanding a post-9/11-style response from the government.
We must never forget “1/6,” the Times insists, even as it tries to memory-hole the summer’s anarchic turmoil.
The recent Times story fit neatly into a narrative about police brutality, in which predatory, violent cops are spreading havoc rather than keeping the peace. The report portrays police across the nation as “poorly trained, heavily militarized and unprepared” for mass unrest.
It’s true that cops need more funding for recruitment and training. They also need better riot equipment, as well as more intelligence about radicals planning mayhem (the role of “protesters” who arrived in armor and prepared for guerrilla warfare was conspicuous by its absence from the Times report).
But whose fault is that? Politicians task police with stopping crime and a host of other jobs, lately including enforcing arbitrary lockdown rules. So it isn’t hard to see why they weren’t prepared for a Black Lives intifada on US streets.
Growing — and successful — calls to “defund” or “reimagine” policing have made things worse, leading to more cutbacks. Blue-state pols’ willingness to betray the police has led to still more resignations. Officers already have a dangerous job; now it’s extra-thankless, too.
Beyond the resources question, the Times narrative blaming the police for the summer riots is pure balderdash.
For starters, the summer uprising itself was unjustifiable: There is no statistical evidence of an epidemic of police violence; cops aren’t in the business of hunting down and killing unarmed African-Americans. Some cops screw up and overreact in difficult situations, with sometimes tragic consequences. But too often, journalists — the same ones now blaming cops for riots — misreport these incidents, creating martyrdom narratives that can’t withstand factual scrutiny.
The notion that cops brutalized the BLM protesters on a mass scale is equally false. In fact, in many cases, cops were ordered to stand down and let the rioters run wild, rather than risk the kind of mass casualties that might have resulted had they attempted to stop the burning and looting. New Yorkers witnessed this dynamic firsthand, though the Times would insist that they not believe their lying eyes.
In some instances, police even abandoned police stations and other government facilities rather than defend them. Citizens who lost their businesses or jobs or were injured no doubt regretted the abdication.
Almost everywhere, it was the protesters who initiated violence. Cops showed heroic patience, as they were physically assaulted and subjected to vile, often-racist insults. Who can forget the pair of radicals, including one high-end lawyer, who hurled a Molotov cocktail at an NYPD vehicle, gravely endangering officers?
Cops aren’t perfect, but lawlessness is infinitely worse. The politicians and chattering classes abandoned the men and women who keep evil and chaos at bay. Liberals are using them as scapegoats to radically reorganize our society, so it conforms with the nostrums of critical race theory. It is that toxic ideology that is to blame for a violent summer.
The Times would like us to forget, of course. But again, we New Yorkers saw the savagery of the radicals. We witnessed what they did to our neighborhood stores. We watched the footage of an officer’s body tumbling in the air after being run over in The Bronx. Our city paid the price for this mad fanaticism. We won’t forget.
And about time.
At least some judges still care:
NY Supreme Court Fires Shot Across the
Bow of the Media
Is America’s liberal news media due for a reckoning? On Friday, March 19, a US Federal Appeals Court Judge wrote in a dissent that today’s media is nothing more than an extension of the Democratic Party. He said the US Supreme Court should remove a 1960s strict standard in New York Times v. Sullivan that requires intentional malice to be proved. The judge said the ruling wrongly shields the media when they misinform, lie, or act overtly partisan.
On Monday, the New
York Supreme Court gave Project Veritas (PV) a major victory over the New York
Times in a defamation case. It’s barely been mentioned in the media. The 16-page decision ruled
against a request by the newspaper to dismiss the case. The ruling is a clear
shot over the bow of the media and could create widespread reach.
Malice at the Heart of
the Matter
New York Supreme Court
Justice Charles Wood denied a motion to dismiss, saying that Project Veritas
provided enough evidence that the New York Times might have acted in “actual
Malice” and “reckless disregard” in articles written by two reporters against
Project Veritas. The ruling opens the door to legal discovery and a civil
trial.
The conservative
watchdog outlet alleges that New York Times reporters Maggie Astor and Tiffany
Hsu published five allegedly false and defamatory articles in the lead-up to
the 2020 general election in September and October. Project Veritas exposed
video of illegal voting practices by the campaign staff of Rep. Ilhan Omar
(D-MN). Two articles, in particular, attacked PV’s work as “disinformation” and
“misinformation.”
Justice Wood went out
of his way to say the New York Times blurred the line between fact and opinion.
PV argues the video speaks for itself and is admissible as proof of fact.
Despite the evidence, the Times argued the articles were “deceptive,” “false,”
and “without evidence.” However, the judge disagreed. He said the Times’
argument was “mere opinion incapable of being judged true or false.” He added
that the writers are obligated to inform the reader that what’s written is his
or her opinion.
Due to the Times’
failure to do so, Wood said the “Plaintiff is entitled to try to establish
whether NYT’s writers were purposely and/or recklessly inaccurate, or whether
they were inaccurate, sloppy, or something less.”
Shot Across the Bow
Many in the media
should see this ruling, and the previous dissent by the federal judge in a
separate case, as warning shots across the bow as the media emphasizes
narratives over news. While polls show Americans no longer trust the media, the
courts could start playing a role if the legal system decides that “actual
malice” is being weaponized in journalism.
Stay tuned. This is an
evolving case.
Don Purdum, Independent Political Analyst
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Some interesting op ed's:
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