UTJ Members of Knesset
With 99.5% of the votes counted, the results of the voting show an unexpected major rise for Likud, with Blue-White falling somewhat.
At this time, probably final results are: Likud has 36 Knesset seats (1,351,368 votes). Blue-White has 33 seats (1,219,870 votes), significantly smaller than Likud. The Joint Arab List is the third largest party with 15 seats (580,044 votes). Shas has 9 seats (352,674 votes). UTJ has 7 seats (274,431 votes), as does Avodah-Meretz-Gesher (267,909 votes) and Yisrael Beiteinu (263,240 votes). Yeminah has 6 seats (240,406 votes).
The so-called Right Bloc is composed of Likud, Shas, UTJ and Yeminah, so their total is 58 seats, short of a majority in the 120 member Knesset.
It is clear that Netanyahu is the majority leader and he will be tasked with forming a government in the next week or so.
There is speculation that some of the members of Blue-White may jump to Likud, since there would only need to be three. There are also rumors about a deal with Avodah.
Blue-White has talked about passing a law that would prohibit anyone under indictment from forming a government. It would apply to the next elections, putting pressure on Netanyahu to reach some deal this time around.
As Netanyahu said during the campaign, Blue-White cannot form a campaign without the Arab party. But including them in any way, whether internally or even supporting from the outside, is very difficult. It would be hard to attack Gaza or Lebanon since the Arab politicians consistently oppose such moves, regardless of the provocations of the other side.
There could be some changes in the final results with a seat or two moving from one party to another.
It is very hard to speculate with any conviction about what is likely to happen until the final results are in. At this point the change of even one seat can cause a big chance in the overall situation.
HaRav G Edelstein and HaRav C Kanievsky voting
