Former Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu leads elections with far-right’s help

Middle East, News November 4, 2022 , by IRIA No Comments

Former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is close to securing a dramatic victory in the 2022 elections. The partial results show that he is on course to win a majority seat in parliament with the help of the far-right bloc.

After 90% vote counts, Netanyahu’s bloc secured 65 out of 120 seats in the Israeli parliament. Netanyahu spoke to a cheering crowd in Jerusalem, “We are close to a big victory” he announced as he was accompanied by his wife Sara Netanyahu.

In order to return back to the Prime Minister’s office, Netanyahu would need help from the ultra-nationalist Religious Zionism party of Israel. The party is known for its anti-Arab and anti-Islamic rhetoric that its leaders, Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich, often use in their speeches. The party also advocates for the deportation of Arabs from Israel for their ‘disloyalty’ towards the Jewish state.

The Religious Zionism party leader Ben-Gvir is a loyal follower of explicitly racist and ultra-nationalist leader late Meir Kahane. Kahane’s organization was banned in Israel and designated as a terrorist group by the United States. Ben-Gvir has also been convicted of incitement to racism and supporting terrorist organizations on several occasions.

As the exit polls started to come out in the favor of the Religious Zionist party, its supporters started to gather in Sheikh Jarrah, an Arab neighborhood in the occupied Jerusalem that has been the center of headlines for illegal settlements by Jewish Israelis. Supporters of the Religious Zionist party chanted anti-Arab slogans and threw stones at Arab houses in Sheikh Jarrah.

Last month, Ben-Gvir also visited Sheikh Jarrah and pulled out a gun after some angry protesters threw stones at him. During his elections campaign, Ben-Gvir promised to “work for all of Israel, even those who hate me.”

The 73-year-old Netanyahu is looking up to the Religious Zionist party for support in sending him back to the prime minister’s office. Netanyahu’s own political party, Likud, has seen a decline in popularity over the course of a few years, especially after his last term as the country’s prime minister.

*^{Israel’s Likud party leader Benjamin Netanyahu and his wife Sara address supporters at the party campaign headquarters in Tel Aviv. (Image Credit: AFP)}*

Netanyahu is a firm supporter of illegal Israeli settlements in Palestine. Such traits became the reason that many left and center political parties parted ways from his style of politics. He opposes the idea of a Palestinian state and supports the idea of including the West Bank and Gaza in the state of Israel.

Although Netanyahu has declared a victory through a speech, current Israeli Prime Minister and Natenyahu’s opponent Yair Lapid told his supporters that “nothing” was yet decided and his center-left Yesh Atid party would wait for the final results.