The Israeli regime’s President Isaac Herzog has formally accepted the certified results of the parliamentary elections, initiating consultations with party leaders to determine who will attempt to cobble together a government. The move delivered an immediate blow to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s desperate efforts to discredit the vote after his hardline bloc lost its majority in the 120-member parliament, while Arab-led factions made historic breakthroughs.

The election results laid bare the deep fractures crippling the Israeli regime. Neither Netanyahu’s coalition (53 seats) nor the opposition bloc led by Gadi Eisenkot (48 seats) attained the 61-seat threshold required to govern. While Eisenkot seeks potential backing from Arab-led parties such as Ra’am and the Joint List, internal mutiny within Netanyahu's camp has exacerbated the crisis. The ultra-Orthodox faction Degel HaTorah broke ranks and withheld its endorsement of Netanyahu over his coalition's failure to exempt Haredi men from military service.

In the wake of the defeat, Netanyahu and his allies floated unsubstantiated allegations that the election had purportedly been stolen through foreign interference. However, the regime's central elections commission firmly dismissed the claims, finding no irregularities that compromised the results, while Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara blocked baseless calls to interrogate elected officials. Amid the friction, Herzog urged leaders to abandon maximalist promises and openly denounced the wave of racist rhetoric directed at Palestinian-Israeli citizens, who comprise about 20 percent of the populace.

Once designated, the prospective prime minister will have 28 days to assemble a fragile coalition. Should the political maneuvering collapse, the Israeli regime is poised to slide into yet another exhausting snap election early next year, prolonging its protracted state of governance failure and ideological deadlock.

Source: www.aljazeera.com