Final Results of Israeli Parliamentary Elections

Final Distribution of Israeli Parliamentary Seats

Thursday February 12, 2009 07:30 by Saed Bannoura - IMEMC & Agencies

Following are the final results of the number of seats each party won in the Israeli parliamentary elections held on February 10. The Kadima party achieved a slight majority over the Likud party with 28 seats to 27. The results brought to surface the extremist Yisrael Beteinu party as a top candidate for coalition.

The following numbers are the number of seats for each party and the number of seats garnered in the previous elections.

- Kadima party, headed by Tzipi Livni; 28 seats, previous elections 29.

- Likud party, headed by Benjamin Netanyahu; 27 seats, previous elections 12.

- Yisrael Beteinu Party, headed by Avigdor Lieberman, 15 seats, previous elections 11.

- Labor party, headed by Ehud Barak, 13 seats, previous elections 19.

- Shas party, 11 seats, previous elections 12.

- Yahdout Ha-torah, 5 seats, previous elections 6.

- Ehud Leumi (National Unity), 4 seats, previous elections 9.

- The Democratic Front, 4 seats, previous elections 3.

- United Arab List; 4 seats same as previous elections.

- The National Democratic Assembly; 3 seats, same as previous elections.

- Meretz; 3 seats, previous elections 5.

- Jewish Home, 3 seats, previous elections 5.

Approximately 65.2% of the registered voters participated in the elections, while in the last elections of nearly 63.5% participated in the polls.

After most of the polls were counter for, Tzipi Livni rushed to hold a meeting with Avigdor Lieberman, head of the Yisrael Beiteinu party in Jerusalem in an attempt to form a coalition.

Livni will have a tough time running a majority government without solid coalitions as the gap between its party and the Likud is only one seat.

Directly after the semi-final results were published, both Livni and Netanyahu declared victory and started conducting efforts in order to form rival coalitions as both leaders argue that they have the right to lead the new government, Israeli online daily, Haaretz, reported.

The winning ticket in this case became the extremist Yisrael Beteinu party headed by Lieberman and his anti-Arab agenda.

Livni met with Lieberman and held talks on a possible coalition.

The Labor party, once a majority, now only holds 13 seats and unable even to defeat Lieberman’s party.

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