Netanyahu's last minute uber-right tactics won. There is a reason for that--a receptive populace.

This piece is a propaganda effort to paper over the continued rise of the right in Israel. It's just like Netanyahu claiming after the election he is really for a two state solution. Fortunately, outside of Israel, people aren't buying this crap any more.

Have you ever been to Israel?

It is one of the most left-wing countries in the world.

if the former, then yes, "the left" gained, since 'the left" consists of every party more moderate than Likud.

If the latter, then Meretz and Hadash. In this election, technically just Meretz, since Hadash got folded into the JAL. And Meretz actually lost a seat.

Palestinians are not Israelis.

They can work for Israelis if they chose to do, but they aren't Israelis by any means.

And yes, they can apply to become one.

Israel is the rogue state that continues the apartheid blight, and I only report on it.

we were once oberliner........not any more .

The right lost votes compared to the last election, and the left gained votes.

And the right moved farther to the right.

Bibi still has to put together a coalition and he can only do that with non-right parties.

...." the right has moved farther to the right. "

" Bibi still has to put together a coalition and he can only do that with non-right parties. "

Its a done deal .

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4640975,00.html

Likudniks has a very very thin line, and Bibi has to submit the coalition for approval which each MK has to affirm its vote, and it's likely he won't have enough.

His hand has actually been improved. It's almost impossible that he won't get a coalition at this point.

He already has 67 seats that recommend him as the next PM.

The numbers sure do Mosby....

Likud got the most votes of any party in Israeli history, 985K, beating Likud 2003, which got 925K.

The OP you posted did you read all of it ?

The morning's gloom reflected not just the disappointing realization that we must go on living with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's noxious and unsteady leadership, but a deeper dismay that there is no longer a place in Israel for the ideals and values that matter most to us. Waking up to the news that Netanyahu controlled six more seats in the Knesset than Isaac Herzog, many on the left took the election results to mean that “something is truly broken, possibly beyond repair,” and that "the nation must be replaced," as Haaretz's Gideon Levy put it.

Noah Efron's attempt to booster moral amongst the Left ....

What needs to be replaced is the entitlement that allows some leftists to complain that the country has been “taken away from us.” What needs to be replaced is our a-pox-on-thee despair. What needs to be replaced is the impatience that leads us on the left to see every election loss as final proof that our democracy is a sham, our past is a lie and our future is lost.

....is falling on deaf ears .

Netanyahu won ...Israel is about to shift more right than it was before these elections .

The Left did not gain votes Mosby......the true Left lost .

Its The End of the Liberal Zionist Façade ...

http://www.counterpunch.org/2015/03/20/the-end-of-the-liberal-zionist-facade/

respect international law on the topic of the OPT?

Herzog and Livni were not going to go that route, so what is liberal minded there?

for starters?

First and foremost on Israel's agenda is peace. They can co-exist with Palestine. They just have to find the path to peace.

Oh, and how about free and fair elections for the Palestinian Authority? Abbas is overextending his stay in the PA leadership role...

my question, btw. An agreement that does not result in a viable state for them will not bring
peace.

that are on the record opposing negotiations for a Palestinian state.

Including the supposedly moderate Kulanu and its head Kahlon, who have ruled out negotiations with Abbas (as if someone better will come along) and instead view the current situation as already having achieved a "two-state situation."

So, the plain fact is that Israel voted against negotiations for a Palestinian state.

67 votes for the apartheid right is still 67 votes for the apartheid right.

Neither UTJ nor Shas are on the record opposing such negotiations. And Yisrael Beiteinu is explicitly on the record supporting the creation of a Palestinian state.

Every single poll of Israelis show that the majority supports a two-state solution.

it has no meaning, except in the negative.

Avigdor Lieberman favors it so long as it means he gets to ethnically cleanse Israel of Arabs, for example.

Yes, Israelis support the two-state solution, so long as it doesn't mean negotiating with the Palestinians with the goal being a sovereign Palestinian state with control over its own borders, airspace, immigration, power to make treaties, and ground water.

And, of course, they don't want to deal with it now.

It's something Israelis say they favor in order to avoid getting in trouble with the US and Europe.

As was perfectly illustrated by Putinyahu last week.

Bibi's economic record is a disaster. So why did they keep him?

Because they want him handling the Palestinians and the Iranians and the US.

Shas also supports a Palestinian State as long as Jews who left Arabs countries are compensated for the property they left behind

and United Torah Judaism has no opinion either way

Shas demands and endorses a compensation package for those Sephardi and Mizrahi Jews that were forced to leave their host countries and their property behind, making it a condition for its being willing to accept any peace deal with the PLO and bilateral peace agreements with Arab Countries.[citation needed]

Shas opposes any form of public expression of homosexuality, including Gay Pride parades, especially in Jerusalem. Shas MK Nissim Ze'ev accused the homosexual community of "carrying out the self-destruction of Israeli society and the Jewish people", calling homosexuals "a plague as toxic as bird flu".[13] However, it officially condemns any form of violence against gays and lesbians.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shas

United Torah Judaism (Yahadut Hatorah - UTJ) is a coalition of two ultra-Orthodox parties, Agudat Israel and Degel HaTorah, which submitted a joint list in the 1992 election, in which it won four Knesset seats. In the 1999 elections, UTJ won five Knesset seats. UTJ wants to maintain a status quo relationship in regard to religion and state issues. UTJ has no opinion on the issue of increasing settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Torah_Judaism

It takes a strong line towards the peace process and the integration of Israeli Arabs, characterized by its 2009 election slogan "No loyalty, no citizenship".[16] Its main platform includes a recognition of the two-state solution, the creation of a Palestinian state that would include an exchange of some largely Arab-inhabited parts of Israel for largely Jewish-inhabited parts of the West Bank.[17] The party maintains an anti-clerical mantle and encourages socio-economic opportunities for new immigrants, in conjunction with efforts to increase Jewish immigration.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yisrael_Beiteinu

started negotiating for a Palestinian state indicate that his support for a Palestinian state is less than sincere. He also wants to re-occupy Gaza.

Shas has a long history of really, really nasty bigotry towards Arabs. Worse than Lieberman even.

They're just hateful and looking for a hook on which to hang Israel. How many of these people excused the election of Hamas?

but until the voting system is reformed, it won't translate itself into anything practical in terms of government.

The UK is IMO going down the drain because of a lack of proportional representation, and Israel because of an excess of it.

Or pre-Nazi Germany.