69% of Votes Counted: Netanyahu Bloc Leads With 54 Seats

Israel’s Central Elections Committee reported Wednesday morning that with 69% of the votes counted, representing approximately 3.4 million voters, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s coalition has secured 54 seats, compared to 48 seats for the opposition bloc led by Gadi Eisenkot. The Arab parties currently hold a combined 17 seats.

The current seat distribution is as follows: Likud 27 seats, Yashar! 21, the Joint List 11, Yachad 11, the Democrats 8, United Torah Judaism 8, Yisrael Beiteinu 7, Shas 7, Otzma Yehudit 7, Religious Zionism-Zehut 6, and Ra’am 6.

The Reservists-Economic party, led by Yoaz Hendel and Yaron Zelekha, is currently 19,803 votes short of passing the electoral threshold. The Amcha Yisrael party, led by Ofer Winter, is 54,888 votes short of the threshold.

All regular ballots are expected to be counted by Wednesday evening, after which officials will begin counting the double envelopes containing votes cast by IDF soldiers and at Israeli embassies around the world.

Elad Naveh, director of the Central Elections Committee’s control center, said it is still too early to assess the impact of the double envelopes. Counting is expected to begin around midnight and will likely be completed by Thursday evening.

“The expectation is for more than half a million envelopes, and we cannot even give a regular seat number, because as long as all the ballot boxes have not been received and the envelopes have not been counted, we don't know,” he said.