Israeli President Isaac Herzog is set to formally announce his decision on Sunday regarding which member of the Knesset he will task with forming the next government.
The announcement follows formal post-election consultations with political party leaders. During these meetings, opposition figures and Arab-led parties backed candidate Gadi Eisenkot, giving him 67 recommendations in the 120-seat Knesset, compared to 46 recommendations for incumbent Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Though designated to receive the mandate, the prospective builder of the coalition will face complex negotiations ahead to secure a stable parliamentary majority.
In televised remarks at the end of the talks, Herzog said that although the “results of the consultations may appear clear”, there were “mutual vetoes between the blocs and within the blocs themselves” that make it difficult to say who has the best chance of assembling a governing coalition.
He said he would hold “personal talks with some of the party leaders” over the Israeli weekend, which runs Friday-Saturday, and make a pick on Sunday.
Impact:
Israel’s October 27 election left neither Netanyahu nor Eisenkot with a clear path to a parliamentary majority, handing Herzog the difficult task of choosing a candidate in a deeply divided country.
Netanyahu’s Likud won the most seats of any single party with 27 in the 120-seat Knesset, but his wider religious-nationalist coalition garnered only 53 in total.
Eisenkot’s alliance of four Jewish-led parties, which spans the political spectrum from centre-left to right, won 48 seats despite polls that had predicted a close race.
Yariv Oppenheimer, a member of the Democrats, a party in Eisenkot’s alliance, told Al Jazeera that he saw “no reason” Herzog would not choose Eisenkot on Sunday.
He said United Torah Judaism had signalled that its support was available for the right price, meaning that a good enough offer from Eisenkot could give him the numbers he needed.
“It’s very clear that Netanyahu doesn’t have a chance to establish a government at all,” he added.
Once nominated by Herzog, the candidate will have 28 days to try to forge a government, with a possible 14-day extension.
Is Netanyahu at risk of losing power?
Netanyahu, at risk of losing power, has seized on an investigation by election officials into possible vote tampering to cast doubt on the results, accusing Arab-led parties of stealing the vote.
Critics accuse Netanyahu and his partners of trying to undermine the results, which he denies.
Israel’s Central Election Committee said on Wednesday that the election’s integrity had not been compromised. The head of the committee, Supreme Court Justice Noam Sohlberg, has called on Israel’s elected officials to protect public trust rather than shake it.
“This is a real danger. One of the foundations of democracy is the peaceful transfer of power,” Sohlberg told Herzog at his residence on Wednesday. High voter turnout, including among the Arab minority, was a blessing, he said.
Netanyahu will remain prime minister in a caretaker government until a new coalition is formed, or through another election that must be held if no candidate succeeds.
