On November 4th local time, the Israeli Central Election Commission officially confirmed the results of the parliamentary elections held last week, and stated that no evidence of violations that could have impaired the fairness of the election or altered the election results was found.
On that day, the presidium of the Israeli Central Election Committee first voted to approve the election results. Among them, representatives from the Future Party and the Blue & White Party voted in favor, while representatives from Netanyahu’s Likud group and its ally, the Shas Party, abstained. Noam Solberg, chairman of the Israeli Central Election Committee and a judge of the Supreme Court, also cast a vote in favor.
Previously, Netanyahu and his supporters claimed several times that Arab parties might have “stepped over” the election victory with the help of foreign forces, but they failed to provide sufficient evidence. The Likud group and other ruling coalition parties also tried to delay the approval of the election results.
Solberg rejected the request. He pointed out that the electoral committee has no authority to delay the official confirmation of election results based solely on information from the investigation or concerns regarding law enforcement.
On the 4th, Solberg, chairman of the Central Election Committee of Israel (left), presented the final election results to Israeli President Ehrlich at a ceremony held at the presidential residence in Jerusalem. Office of the Israeli Government Information
Israel’s Central Election Commission stated in a statement on the 4th: “The review results show that there is no evidence of any violations that would harm the fairness of the election or affect the election results.”
The acting director of the Central Election Commission, Dean Lifne, stated that the commission has conducted a ‘thorough and individual’ investigation into each complaint, and found no evidence to support claims that the election results were invalid.
Israeli President Ehrlich received the election results submitted by Solberg on April 4th. Solberg warned at the ceremony, "In recent days, there have been attempts to discredit the election results. This is a real danger. We must respect democratic rules and must not deviate from this path."
Israel held its 26th parliamentary elections on October 27. According to the final results, the Likud group led by Netanyahu won 27 seats, while the right-wing and religious parties together obtained 53 seats, losing their majority in parliament. Its main rival, the Party of Integrity led by former Chief of Staff of the Defence Forces Ehsenkot, won 21 seats, with its coalition gaining 48 seats. Arab parties secured 19 seats.
Because the Israeli Knesset has 120 seats, forming a government requires at least 61 seats. Currently both major camps have not reached this threshold.
