As the voting in Israel's fourth election in under two years ended at 10 p.m. on Tuesday, exit polls showed Likud in the lead with 31 seats, putting Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu within reach of securing the 61 mandates necessary to form a government – providing that Yamina leader Naftali Bennett rejoins the right-wing bloc.

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Shortly after the exit polls were released, Bennett said, "I will only do what is good for the State of Israel." He did not elaborate further.

Public broadcaster Kan 11 News projected the following results:

According to this poll, the Arab Ra'am party and the Economic party failed to cross the four-seat electoral threshold.

The public broadcaster thus gave the right-wing bloc 54 seats, and the Center-Left bloc 59 seats, with Yamina as the party that can change the balance of power in the next government.

Channel 12 News predicted the following results:

Here, too, Ra'am and the Economic party failed to cross the electoral threshold.

Israel's largest commercial broadcaster gave the right-wing bloc 53 seats, and the Center-Left bloc 59 seats, naming Yamina as the party that could decide the fate of the elections.

Channel 13 News gave the following results:

Here, too, Ra'am and the Economic party did not make it into the 24th Knesset.

The outlet echoed Kan's results, predicting 54 mandates for the right-wing bloc and 59 for the Center-Left, with Yamina as the swing faction.

On average, the combined exit polls yielded the following projections:

The results put both blocs within reach of cobbling together a coalition – as long as Yamina joins one of them. However, as Bennett has vowed not to join a government led by Netanyahu or by Yesh Atid head Yair Lapid, it is unclear where the national-religious party is headed.

The fact that Ra'am failed to enter parliament also deals a blow to both political blocs, as it, too, could have shifted the balance of power in either direction, although to a lesser extent.

Central Elections Committee Head Attorney Orly Adas said on Tuesday morning that the results of the elections may not be clear until Friday, adding that the final results will only be available next week.

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Seven months after it was formed, the Likud-Blue and White unity government missed the deadline to pass a state budget and dissolved itself as of midnight Tuesday, meaning that Israel will be holding a fourth general election in a space of under two years.

On Monday evening, a last-ditch attempt to salvage the 23rd Knesset by passing a law to push back the deadline for a budget failed. Four members of the coalition – Assaf Zamir, Miki Haimovitch, and Ram Shefa from Blue and White and MK Michal Shir from the Likud – voted against the bill, causing it to fall in a vote of 49:47.

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On Tuesday evening, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu excoriated Alternate Prime Minister and Blue and White leader Benny Gantz and Justice Minister Avi Nissankoren for bringing the government to an end.

"Gantz capitulated and let Avi Nissankoren run the show," Netanyahu said, referring to Blue and White's efforts to stop Netanyahu's various appointments and refusal to reform the Justice Ministry in a way that would have saved the 2019 unity deal between Likud and Blue and White.

"It's no secret, I never wanted an election. I voted time after time against an election, and unfortunately, Gantz went back on our agreement and dragged Israel into an election because of internal power struggles," Netanyahu said

As of Wednesday morning, the timeline for the 2021 elections was as follows: Feb. 3 or 4 will be the deadline for parties to submit their lists for the 24^th Knesset. Parties and political officials will have until Feb. 11 to submit petitions to disqualify parties or individual candidates from the election.

By Feb. 16, election material will be sent to Israeli embassies and consulates abroad to allow government representatives to vote. On Feb. 21, the Central Elections Committee is scheduled to approve the party lists, and the fateful day itself is scheduled for March 23, 2021, shortly before Passover.

On March 31, the final election results are scheduled to be published.

The 24th Knesset is scheduled to hold its opening session on April 6, 2021.

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Israeli political battle lines often fracture along how the country balances Jewish religion and liberal democracy. These tensions were a central issue in this week's national election, and are sure to influence the composition of the country's next government.

While the country's Jewish majority is largely secular, parties representing the ultra-Orthodox minority have traditionally wielded considerable political power.

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Acting as coalition kingmakers, religious parties hold a monopoly on many areas of daily life, from the closure of stores and public transport on Shabbat to Jewish burial and marriage rites.

Israel has granted the ultra-Orthodox community sweeping exemptions from the country's mandatory military draft. This has built resentment among the secular majority, who are required to serve.

After Israel held elections last April, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's prospective governing coalition collapsed because a secular ally, Yisrael Beytenu party leader Avigdor Lieberman, insisted on legislation to force young ultra-Orthodox men to also serve in the military.

Playing on this theme, Lieberman's party boosted its strength in Tuesday's election and is poised to be a central player in the next coalition government. He is insisting on a broad secular partnership with the country's two largest parties.

"Israelis voted more on religion and state as a result of the political growth and appetite of the ultra-Orthodox parties," said Yohanan Plesner, president of the Israel Democracy Institute, a Jerusalem think tank.

Of Israel's 9 million people, 75% are Jewish. Most of the population is secular, traditional, or Modern Orthodox, and 14% are ultra-Orthodox, according to Israel's Central Bureau of Statistics. Another 20% of the population is made up by the country's Muslim, Christian and Druze Arabs.

As coalition negotiations get set to begin, here's a look at religion's role in Israeli politics:

Orthodox

The two ultra-Orthodox parties – the predominantly Ashkenazi United Torah Judaism and Sephardi Shas party representing Jews of Middle Eastern descent – and the national religious Yamina faction, advocate a greater place for Orthodox Judaism in state life, including religious education and shutting public transportation on Shabbat.

They also have rejected efforts to dissolve a long-standing exemption for religious men to study in seminaries in lieu of having to serve in the military.

Religious Jewish parties won nearly 20% of the vote in Tuesday's repeat election. In recent decades, those parties have typically united with the conservative Likud party to form a governing coalition. But this time, the religious-nationalist bloc fell short of a majority in the Knesset, Israel's parliament, winning only 55 of the 120 seats.

Secular

Several of the main liberal parties – Blue and White, Yisrael Beytenu, Labor, and the Democratic Union – ran on a secular platform, advocating measures such as universal military draft that includes ultra-Orthodox men and civil marriage. Currently, all Jewish marriages in Israel must be performed by the country's Orthodox Rabbinate, which requires that both partners be Jewish and that the ceremony adhere to Orthodox custom.

Lieberman's staunchly secular Yisrael Beytenu party is supported mainly by mostly nonreligious, Russian-speaking immigrants from the former Soviet Union.

Blue and White, headed by former IDF Chief of Staff Benny Gantz, campaigned ahead of election day with ads calling for a "secular national unity government." Those calls were echoed by Lieberman, who supports a partnership with Gantz and Netanyahu that excludes the ultra-Orthodox parties.

Arabs

The majority of Israel's roughly 20% Arab minority are Sunni Muslims, with the remainder made up of Druze and Christians. Most self-define as traditional or religious, according to the Central Bureau of Statistics. The Joint Arab List, a union of four smaller factions, including a secular nationalist, an Islamist, and a communist party, won a projected 13 seats in the Knesset. Most Arabs tend to vote based on national identity rather than along religious lines.

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The two largest parties – Netanyahu's reigning right-wing Likud party, and center-left challenger Blue and White, led by Benny Gantz and Yair Lapid – are nearly tied, though some 10% of the votes have yet to be counted. Results may change slightly over the next few days as the final votes are tallied.

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Among the other seven parties to enter the government, the alliance of right-wing and religious parties that pledged to support Netanyahu's premiership secured only 55 mandates – six seats short of a parliamentary majority. At the same time, secular and left-wing parties that pledged to support a Gantz-led government secured only 52 mandates. The Joint Arab List secured 13 mandates, making it the third-largest party in the Knesset.

Since the founding of the State of Israel, no Arab party has ever joined a coalition government. Joint Arab List leader Ayman Odeh has pledged not to support a Netanyahu-led government; however, if the Joint Arab List were to break its longstanding tradition and join an Israeli government led by Gantz, the Left would have a clear majority.

Gantz himself, and other natural Blue and White allies, have pledged not to sit in a government with the Arab parties, whose vision for the State of Israel is clearly at odds with that of the Jewish parties. At his post-election speech, Netanyahu called the Joint Arab List a union of "anti-Zionist Arab parties that oppose the very existence of Israel as a Jewish and democratic state – parties that praise and glorify bloodthirsty terrorists who kill our soldiers, our citizens, our children."

Joint Arab List Knesset member Ahmad Tibi said on Wednesday that "we won't and cannot take any part in the government or the coalition," but added that "there are other ways to advance what we want as a joint ticket, to influence the decision-making process, and to be a significant actor in the parliament and in politics."

In the days ahead, each party will send a delegation to meet with Israel's President Reuven Rivlin and recommend their preferred candidate for prime minister. Based on the recommendations, Rivlin will select the Knesset member he believes is most likely to form a majority coalition. With both the right-wing and left-wing blocs short of an obvious coalition, Netanyahu and Gantz will attempt to recruit factions within larger parties to break party discipline and cross over to provide one side with a majority. Should those attempts fail, as is expected, Rivlin will seek to convince the Likud, and Blue and White parties, to form a national unity government.

Following the publication of initial results, Gantz himself has called for the parties to unite, stating, "For a long time, we were busy with the campaign, and now the time has come to work on what matters. I'll wish the State of Israel a strong unity government."

Meanwhile, when asked whether the results mean the end of Netanyahu's 10-year reign as prime minister, Gantz said, "We'll have to wait and see."

Together, the two largest parties total 64 seats, enough to form a government by themselves. Should they agree to join a coalition, other parties both to the right and left would likely attempt to join, creating the possibility of an even larger government. While neither party has ruled out a unity coalition, Gantz supporters have pledged not to join any government led by Netanyahu.

'At a historical juncture'

Meanwhile, Likud maintains strong party discipline and appears unwilling to support either a Gantz-led government or a Likud-led government headed by someone other than the current prime minister.

Following exit-poll results, Netanyahu told Likud members that "all of the Likud's partners want to move forward together to build a strong government and not permit a dangerous anti-Zionist government." He added that "we will stand united in the missions ahead for Likud and for Israel. We are still waiting for the true results but one thing is clear: The State of Israel is at a historical juncture ahead of great security and diplomatic challenges and opportunities."

The results are similar to those of the April elections, which left Netanyahu just one seat short of a majority after the stunning defection of Avigdor Lieberman's Yisrael Beytenu Party and its five seats from the pro-Netanyahu camp.

Lieberman has successfully bolstered his popularity in the September elections, securing nine mandates. He has been publicly calling for a secular unity government that would cut out the ultra-Orthodox parties that have supported Netanyahu.

After the April elections, Netanyahu convinced the Knesset to disband itself and go to the polls for the second time in a year, rather than form a unity government.

With neither the pro-Netanyahu camp nor the anti-Netanyahu camp in a clear majority, party leaders will need to put egos and pledges aside to cross bloc lines in order to create a functioning government. Such scenarios could include secular or left-wing party members joining a Netanyahu-led government; Likud members joining a Gantz-led government; a Likud-led government with someone other than Netanyahu at the helm; or a rotation arrangement.

Within Likud, there is no clear heir apparent if Netanyahu is unable to serve. Furthermore, prior to the elections, Netanyahu had all party members sign a (nonbinding) declaration that they would not support any other Likud candidate for prime minister, though all bets may be off if he proves unable to form a Knesset majority.

Complicating matters further is a rotation arrangement already in place within the Blue and White party, whereby party co-leader Yair Lapid would become prime minister should Blue and White lead the country for two-and-a-half years.

If the parties cannot come to some sort of coalition arrangement, Israelis would be sent back to the polls yet again – a scenario that Rivlin and Knesset members have pledged to avoid. It is unlikely that the Knesset would vote to dissolve itself as it did following April's election. As such, the makeup of a new government may not be known for many weeks.

Unless Netanyahu can find at least a handful of supporters from among parties who have committed to ending his reign, Israel's longest-serving prime minister may find himself passing the keys to a political opponent on the Left or another member of the Likud party.

Reprinted with permission from JNS.org.

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Despite the chilling predictions that the Arab sector would see even lower voter turnout than it did in the election for the 20^th Knesset (under 50%), it was clear starting early Tuesday that Arabs were showing up to vote. Long lines could be seen at polling stations in Arab communities from the North to the Negev.

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While many Arab voters admitted freely that they had been encouraged by the reunification of the Joint Arab List, they were mainly encouraged to vote by a campaign that they said put anti-Arab incitement in the center of public discourse, and tried to characterize the sector as working to "steal" the election.

After its success in the election, the Joint Arab List faces a number of major challenges. First and foremost, the Arab Israeli public expects the Joint list to work on behalf of its constituency.

The Joint Arab List will be the party mainly responsible for addressing crime, illegal weapons, and murder in the Arab sector, as well as poverty and strengthening the Arab school system, and adding classrooms and clinics in Arab communities and mixed cities.

The Arab public truly feels that Tuesday was a historic day, one that will change the political map in Israel.

However, many wonder if the Joint Arab List will be able to channel its electoral success into political achievements that benefit the Arab sector, or whether its representatives will get bogged down in political battles and conflicting interests between the members of the four parties that comprise the list: Hadash, Ta'al, Ra'am, and Balad.

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Likud and Blue and White are essentially tied with around 32 seats. While the Likud and its traditional allies on the Right have a clear majority, one of those allies – MK Avigdor Lieberman's Yisrael Beytenu party – has refused to back Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu this time around, which may prevent Netanyahu from assembling a coalition and forming a new government.

The Left is poised to get slightly more seats than in the April election (particularly in light of revised exit poll data from Channel 13 News) but faces an uphill battle in forming a governing coalition that would win the support of the Knesset through a confidence vote.

Lieberman's Yisrael Beytenu, which is expected to get around nine seats, is a wildcard in this election. Lieberman vowed late Tuesday that he would not throw his support behind either bloc but would insist on a unity government.

However, this seems impossible to achieve since Blue and White has ruled out sitting in a government with Netanyahu, due to the prime minister's potential indictment in three separate corruption cases. This could result in a prolonged stalemate or even another election.

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When the results of the exit polls conducted by Channels 11, 12, and 13 were integrated, the results were as follows:

Blue and White: 33.6

Likud: 32

Joint Arab List: 12

Yisrael Beytenu: 8.6

Shas: 8.6

Yamina: 8

United Torah Judaism: 8

Democratic Union: 5.3

Labor-Gesher: 5.3

None of the polls showed the far-right Otzma Yehudit passing the minimum electoral threshold.

Channel 12's exit poll predicted the following number of seats for the 22^nd Knesset:

Blue and White: 34

Likud: 33

Yisrael Beytenu: 8

Yamina: 8

Labor-Gesher: 5

Democratic Union: 5

Shas: 8

United Torah Judaism: 8

Joint Arab List: 11

The Channel 11 exit poll gave the Likud and Blue and White 32 seats each, and 10 seats for Yisrael Beytenu.

Channel 11 predicted 12 seats for the Joint Arab List, 9 for Shas, 8 for United Torah Judaism, 7 for Yamina, and 5 each for Labor-Gesher and the Democratic Union.

The Channel 11 results also showed Otzma Yehudit failing to pass the minimum threshold.

Channel 13's exit poll also showed Blue and White in the lead, with 33 seats, followed by the Likud at 31.

Channel 13 predicted 13 seats for the Joint Arab List, 9 for Shas, 8 each for United Torah Judaism and Yisrael Beytenu, and 6 each for Yamina, the Democratic Union, and Labor-Gesher.

Otzma Yehudit failed to pass the minimum electoral threshold.

How do the numbers shake out when we look at the blocs?

According to Channel 12, the Right has 57 seats compared to 55 for the Center-Left.

Channel 13 gave 58 seats to the Center-Left and 54 to the Right, with Yisrael Beytenu in a position to tip the scales, with a projected 8 seats.

Yisrael Beytenu had even more influence on the blocs according to the Channel 11 results, which gave the Center-Left 54 seats and 56 seats to the Right, with 10 for Yisrael Beytenu.

When the results of all exit polls were integrated, the Right and Left were tied with 56 seats each, with 8 in the hands of Yisrael Beytenu.

It will take at least two days of ballot counting to arrive at the final results for the second election of 2019.

Voting took place at 10,885 voting stations across the country, with 6,394,030 Israelis on the rolls as eligible to vote.

In the previous election, in April, parties needed 32,860 votes for one Knesset mandate. To pass the electoral threshold, parties need 3.25% of the overall votes. The voter turnout rate in the April election was 68.5%.

As of 8 p.m., 3,418,531 voters had cast their ballots, 63.7% of eligible voters and 2.4 percentage points more than had voted at the same time on Election Day on April 9.

Early Wednesday, the official vote count began as election ballots were handed over to the headquarters of the Central Elections Committee. Voter turnout for the election stood at 69.4%, a small uptick than April's vote.

In the 70 years since the country's first election, the voter turnout rate has steadily declined. The 1949 election recorded an all-time high turnout of 86.9%.

In 2013, for the first time since the state's inception, fewer than 70% of Israelis – 68.9% – exercised their democratic right to vote, while voter turnout for the 17th Knesset in 2006 was at an all-time low of 63.5%.

Subsequent elections began seeing an uptick in voter participation; in the election for the 20th Knesset, voter turnout – at 72.34% – passed the 70% mark for the first time in a decade.

As stated, voter turnout in April dipped below the 70% mark to 68.5%, and this time around, in an effort to learn from their mistakes, the parties had plans to make sure their supporters actually went out and vote.

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Fighting for political survival after an inconclusive ballot in April, the right-wing Netanyahu has made voter fraud a key issue in his campaign for a fifth term, cautioning that victory could be stolen from him in what polls show to be a close race.

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On election days in Israel, representatives of most parties sit at venues to check the pre-vote identification process. Voters are then handed an envelope and go behind a screen to cast their ballot in private.

Addressing his cabinet on Sunday, Netanyahu said that under the legislation, which will go to parliament for approval before the Sept. 17 election, monitors will be able to use their cellular telephone cameras to record outside the actual voting booth.

"Everyone films," Netanyahu said in public remarks at the meeting. "Any shop is filmed by cameras, so the polling stations are the only places where you can't film?"

In his comments to the cabinet, which government officials said approved the legislation unanimously, Netanyahu pledged: "The secrecy of the vote will be strictly preserved."

Ayman Odeh, head of the Arab Joint List, said on Twitter that Netanyahu's focus on the issue of voter fraud was aimed at "triggering a panic vote" by his supporters on the right and "suppressing the Arab vote."

"[Netanyahu] is preparing the ground for the day he declares, 'Arabs have stolen the elections,' and contests the results if he loses," Odeh said.

Yair Lapid, co-leader of the center-left Blue and White Party, which is running neck-and-neck with Likud in polls, alluded to the impact the deployment of cameras might have on Arab voter turnout, describing the bill as "racist" in comments on Twitter.

The bill was also opposed by Supreme Court Justice Hanan Melcer, head of the Central Election Committee, which oversees the vote, who said the last-minute introduction of cameras might "lead to chaos."

Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit also came out against the legislation, saying it could violate laws ensuring voters' privacy.

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The far-right Otzma Yehudit party has the staunchest supporters: according to the poll, 91% of Otzma Yehudit supporters said they were certain to vote for the party.

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The haredi parties United Torah Judaism and Shas are also expected to see a strong turn-out, with 78% and 72%, respectively of their supporters telling pollsters that they were certain to vote for those parties on Election Day.

A higher percentage of Blue and White supporters (56%) than Likud voters (46%) said they were very certain about whom they would be supporting on Sept. 17.

Only 45% of supporters of Avigdor Lieberman's Yisrael Beytenu party, which according to most polls is likely to come out of the election in a position to decide the make-up of the next government, said they would certainly be voting for Yisrael Beytenu.

Some 50% of respondents who support Yamina (formerly the New Right) said they were very certain of their choice, compared to 39% of respondents who support Labor-Gesher. Slightly more than half (53%) of supporters of the other major left-wing party, the Democratic Union, said they were very certain that they would be voting for the Democratic Union.

Only 37% of respondents who support the Joint Arab List said they were very certain they would be voting for that party.

The poll also looked at which other parties' respondents were also inclined to support their party, if at all. According to the results, 16% of Likud supporters said the center-left Blue and White would be their second choice. Some 100% of Labor voters said that Blue and White would be their second choice, compared to 20% of Yamina supporters and 44% of Yisrael Beytenu supporters who said that Blue and White was their No. 2 choice.

The Likud was the second choice for 10% of United Torah Judaism supporters; 40% of Yamina supporters; 33% of Yisrael Beytenu supporters; and 50% of Shas supporters.

The poll attempted to project the number of seats each party would win based only on supporters who said they were very certain about their choices. In that scenario, 31 seats were projected for Blue and White, compared to 30 for the Likud. Yisrael Beytenu was predicted to finish in third place, with 11 seats, followed by the Joint Arab List, with 10.

On the Left, Labor-Gesher was projected to win six seats and the Democratic Union was predicted to win four seats.

On the Right, eight seats were predicted for Yamina, and Otzma Yehudit gained a seat, winning a predicted five seats.

United Torah Judaism and Shas were predicted to win eight and seven seats, respectively.

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As you probably know, Israelis vote for parties, not for individual candidates. The parties pick ordered lists of candidates (how they do this is up to the parties), and each party gets a number of seats in the Knesset proportional to the number of votes it receives. The seats are ordered, so if a party gets a third of the total vote, the first 40 candidates on its list get seats.

Then the president will consult with the various parties and pick the Knesset member he believes most likely to successfully form a government. Usually – but not necessarily – this is the No. 1 member of the party with the most seats. Of course, no party ever gets a true majority, so after the election come the coalition negotiations.

In April's election, the constellation of right-wing parties, led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's Likud, came out far ahead of the Center-Left, led by Benny Gantz and his Blue and White party (actually, it's hard to call it a party – it's more like a conglomeration of personalities with differing political viewpoints who agree on one major principle: opposing Netanyahu).

Although the Likud by itself achieved only a small margin over Blue and White, Netanyahu's big advantage was that he had – or at least thought he had – enough coalition partners to put together a majority in the 120-member Knesset. Gantz was far behind, being unable to get 61 members in a coalition even if he were to ask the non-Zionist Arab parties to join him, something which hasn't happened in Israel's history.

Israeli coalition negotiations are notoriously ugly, with small parties trying to extort the maximum number of important Cabinet positions, promises to support or kill particular legislation, or money for pet projects or specific segments of the population, before they agree to sign on. But usually everyone wants to get on with it, and compromises are made before time runs out.

This time, one of Netanyahu's partners, Avigdor Lieberman, whose Yisrael Beytenu party is made up mostly of secular Russian immigrants, and which won five Knesset seats in April, refused to join the coalition unless the government passed a law Lieberman had initiated back when he was defense minister. The law calls for an increasing number of yeshiva students to be drafted and applies financial penalties to yeshivas that don't meet conscription targets.

The haredi parties would not agree, although they were willing to discuss a compromise. But Lieberman insisted: The law must be passed "without changing [so much as] a comma." Lieberman's five seats made the difference between a 65-seat majority and the inability to form a government.

Everyone believed that a last-minute compromise would be made, or that Netanyahu would persuade an opposition member to jump ship or pull some other rabbit out of his hat. But it didn't happen. Netanyahu's only options were to inform President Reuven Rivlin that he could not form a coalition, in which case Rivlin could ask Gantz or any other member of the Knesset to try, or to get the Knesset to pass a bill to dissolve itself and call for a new election. Whether anyone else could have succeeded was uncertain, but rather than take the chance, Netanyahu chose other election. They will be held in September.

Until then, Netanyahu will remain prime minister. The Knesset will not introduce any new bills. Soon the campaigns will start all over again. It's been estimated that the election will cost the Treasury 475 million shekels ($131 million), and the obligatory day off for all workers will cost the country as much as a billion shekels.

The lack of a government capable of making serious commitments will also mean that U.S. President Donald Trump's "deal of the century" – at least, the political part of it – will be put off until after the election, and after the coalition negotiations that must follow. That won't be until the end of the year, which will be just about when the pre-election frenzy in the United States starts. Various domestic issues of importance will languish, such as the reform of Israel's Supreme Court, which I believe is essential and should be decoupled from any attempt to grant Netanyahu immunity from prosecution on the several corruption charges pending against him.

And it's possible that the whole thing could happen again this September.

It's totally unacceptable that the creation of a new government can be stymied by one stubborn individual, whose party received about 4.2% of the vote.

The general problem is the way a small party can exploit its position to gain massive leverage and benefits. The haredi parties, who are prepared to go with either the Right or Left depending on who offers them the best deal in cabinet positions, money for yeshivas, freedom from military service, and Torah-based legislation, are famous for this, but they are not the only ones that do it. Of course, this applies once there is a government as well as at coalition-making time; if they are unhappy, they can vote with the opposition to bring down a government.

The bribes paid to the various prospective coalition partners – and bribes are exactly what they are – are expensive. New ministries and their staffs are created to give jobs to important partners. Institutions are subsidized, welfare benefits for particular segments of society are expanded, and so forth. The negotiators are generous. Why shouldn't they be? It's absolutely vital (they think) that their party get to lead the nation, and it's taxpayer money anyway.

There were too many small parties, so the percentage of the vote needed to get into the Knesset was raised. It presently stands at 3.25%, which means that if a party doesn't get that many votes (equivalent to four seats), they get no seats and their votes are lost. This is what happened to my vote this April when the New Right party of Naftali Bennett and Ayelet Shaked missed the cut-off by a mere thousand votes. Now there aren't numerous one- and two-seat factions in the Knesset, but the extortion problem still exists. And the high cut-off harms the medium-size parties because it impels voters to choose the biggest parties out of fear of having their votes neutralized.

There are some very good things about Israel's system. A citizen makes a clear ideological choice in voting for a party, and Israelis care about ideology. Even if you vote for a party that just makes it over the threshold with four or five seats, your people will have influence in the Knesset, and perhaps in the cabinet, if they join the coalition. Unlike the American or British systems in which parliamentary candidates stand for election from geographical districts, there is no problem of gerrymandering (drawing district boundaries to disenfranchise voters of a particular party or particular ethnic groups). The gridlock caused by a conflict between the executive and legislative branches, so characteristic of the American government, is far less likely.

I don't have an easy solution. Politics is politics, and it will always involve deals in smoke-filled rooms. But is there anything we can do to clean up the coalition system without losing the worthwhile parts?

This column first appeared on AbuYehuda.com and is reprinted with permission from JNS.org.

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The September election will once again prove wrong the Palestinian Authority's claim that Israel is an "apartheid state"; Israeli Arabs will exercise their voting rights on equal terms with Israel's Jewish citizens.

Responding to the results of Israel's April 9 election, PLO chief negotiator and Fatah Central Committee member Saeb Erekat said the vote showed Israel has a "policy of apartheid and racial segregation."

"The preliminary results of the Israeli elections have clearly shown that the Israeli voters have voted to keep the situation as it is. They have voted to continue the occupation. They have voted to continue the apartheid and the racial segregation. In reality, the competition during the election campaign was over who on the Israeli side could continue the status quo, the policy of apartheid and racial segregation, but at a reduced cost," he said (Official PA TV News, April 10, 2019).

A comparison focusing on the rights of Israeli Arabs compared to the rights of black South Africans under the apartheid regime shows that the reality could not be more different.

Examination of the voting patterns of Israeli Arabs living in Arab towns and villages shows that an abyss separates the PA's claims about Israel and the reality. According to statistics published by the Central Election Committee, among Israeli Arab voters who live in exclusively Arab towns (constituting 13.1% of the electorate), 49.6% chose to vote. Of these, 27.2% voted for Zionist parties.

The actual numbers are likely much higher; many Israeli Arabs live in mixed Jewish-Arab cities, such as Haifa, Lod and Jerusalem. It is impossible to determine which parties these Israeli Arabs voted for because balloting is secret and Israeli Jews and Israeli Arabs in mixed cities use the same polling stations.

Read more at Palestinian Media Watch.

This article is reprinted with permission from JNS.org.

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