He has 59 seats in the 120-seat parliament - two short of a ruling majority.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu led on Tuesday in Israel’s third national election in less than a year but was short of a governing majority, nearly complete results showed.
But Gantz stopped short of conceding defeat, saying the election could result in another deadlock and he understood and shared his supporters’ “feeling of disappointment and pain”. That beckoned Gantz’s centrist Blue and White and ex-defense minister Avigdor Lieberman’s secularist-nationalist Yisrael Beiteinu parties. But Gantz has ruled out sitting with Netanyahu, and Lieberman has long feuded with the premier’s ultra-Orthodox Jewish partners over their constituents’ state benefits.
Likud led Blue and White by 36 seats to 32, and Lieberman’s party, with seven, could tip the balance in complicated coalition building. A Likud spokesman said he expected Netanyahu to get lawmakers from the opposing camp to cross sides.“As we promised voters, we will do everything to prevent a fourth election and we intend to take decisive action, one way or another,” Lieberman told Israeli Channel 12 TV.
The mostly Arab Joint List party again emerged as the third-largest, growing to 15 seats from 13 in the last election.Israel’s economy has weathered the political stalemate, with growth strong and the labour market tight. The main issue is that no budget has been approved since the 2019 one was passed two years ago.
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