Strange! Why is it so difficult for Israel to form a cabinet in three general elections in less than a year？
CCTV News:Israel local time today (March 2) morning, that is, Beijing time today (March 2) afternoon, Israel’s 23rd parliamentary elections began to vote. At present, 29 political parties and coalitions of political parties have decided to stand for election. According to the latest polls, the Likud Party, the largest right-wing conservative party in Israel led by the current Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and the Blue and White Party, the middle party, rank high and have equal strength.
This election is the first time that Israel has held a general election for the third time in less than a year. In April and September 2019, Israel held the 21st and 22nd parliamentary elections. After two sessions of parliament, they were dissolved because of the failure to form a cabinet.
Israel is a parliamentary country, with a total of 120 seats in the parliament, and political parties with more than half of the seats can form a separate cabinet. However, due to the proliferation of small and medium-sized parties, there has never been a single party forming a cabinet in Israeli history.
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[News Background] It is difficult to form a cabinet. Israel has held three general elections in less than a year.
Due to the serious differences between parties and the difficulty in reconciling interests, Israel has been deadlocked in forming a cabinet after the first two general elections, and the new government has always been "difficult to produce", which has also led to the "strange phenomenon" of Israel holding three general elections in less than one year for the first time in history.
On April 9 last year, Israel held the 21st parliamentary election. Although Netanyahu, the leader of Likud Group and the current Prime Minister, obtained the right to form a cabinet, he failed to successfully form a ruling Coalition within the prescribed time limit. The reason is that the right-wing party "Israel is our homeland" led by former Israeli Defense Minister Lieberman is difficult to balance the interests of several other religious parties, which led to the "abortion" of forming a cabinet and forced the parliament to dissolve and hold another general election.
After the 22nd parliamentary election held on September 17th last year, Israeli President rivlin authorized Netanyahu and the leader of the "Blue and White Party" Ganz to form a cabinet, but their efforts to form a cabinet still ended in failure because of the great differences between the parties. Lieberman called for the formation of a "broad and free coalition government" composed of Likud Group, Blue White Party and Israel is our homeland. However, the negotiations among Netanyahu, Ganz and Lieberman failed to reach an agreement.
Compared with the previous two general elections, the third general election to be voted today has added several uncertainties.
First of all, on January 28th, the United States announced the so-called "New Middle East Peace Plan" to promote the settlement of the Palestinian-Israeli issue, which was explicitly rejected by the Palestinian side, and the tension between Palestine and Israel escalated again. And about half of Israelis believe that this move of the United States aims to intervene in Israeli elections and help Netanyahu win — — But not long ago, Netanyahu, suspected of corruption, was formally charged, and the case will be heard on the 17th of this month, half a month after the general election, which is very likely to affect voters’ voting intention.
At the same time, there have been some changes in the position of Netanyahu’s main rival Ganz — — Although "refusing to face trial with Netanyahu ‘ Take turns to govern ’ " His position has not changed, but Ganz turned to oppose the "Joint List" party of the Arab political party alliance to join the Coalition government and supported the so-called "New Middle East Peace Plan" of the United States, which may make the "Blue and White Party" lose some votes of the center-left voters.
[News Watch] I am afraid that the deadlock in the formation of the cabinet is still difficult to break.
At present, analysts are generally worried that after the end of the third general election in less than a year, Israel may still face a "tug-of-war" to form a cabinet, which will lead to the deadlock of forming a cabinet again.
Many polls before the election showed that Likud Group and Blue and White Party are still evenly matched, and both sides may win about 33 seats, with a difference of at most two seats — — The third general election may still be difficult to change the political deadlock after the previous two general elections.
In the previous two general elections, the Likud Party and the Blue-White Party tried their best to win over their allies, but they failed to win at least 61 of the 120 parliamentary seats needed to form a cabinet. It can be seen that after the third general election, the two parties still need to win over the "Israel is our home" party led by Lieberman. However, it is still very difficult for both Netanyahu and Ganz to pull Lieberman into their respective camps.
As domestic analysts in Israel have said, "it is hard to see substantial changes in the Israeli political situation after the third general election", and the dystocia of the new government will directly affect the deliberation of Israel’s national budget and the introduction of important decisions. Israel’s political system is facing a serious crisis, and some people even have to silently accept the possibility of holding the fourth general election next — — If we want to break the deadlock in the formation of the cabinet, we must make a decisive compromise between the various parties.