Israel to Hold March Election After Deadline Expires for New Government

Wednesday’s deadline to form a unified government expired, leading Israel into its third national election over a span of 12 months.

Record-Breaker

A series of firsts for Israel as the third elections, set for March 2, 2020, are also predated by Netanyahu becoming the first sitting prime minister to be indicted on corruption charges.

Netanyahu, who might request immunity from prosecution, was indicted on charges of bribery, fraud and breach of trust. Netanyahu may also not be leading Likud into the coming elections, due to the party saying it is likely that a leadership primary will be held on December 26.

“There is a national need for a breakthrough that will end the ongoing political crisis, enable the formation of a strong government, and to unite the people of Israel,” Former Interior Minister Gideon Saar wrote on Twitter.

Netanyahu and Gantz’ parties Likud and Blue and White failed to reach the 61-seat majority threshold to form a government in the 120-seat Knesset, and afterwards failing to form a unity government over disagreements on how power should be shared and distributed.

Netanyahu blamed political rivals Blue and White before the Wednesday deadline, saying they created "a flood of political spin:”

“They want to hide the fact that they did everything possible to avoid the establishment of a broad national unity government that would annex the Jordan Valley, apply Israeli sovereignty on the settlements in Judea and Samaria. They forced new elections on us. It is unnecessary and in order to avoid it happening again there is one thing to do and that is to win, and win big – and that is what we’ll do,” the prime minister said.