As PM declares victory, Herzog hails party’s ‘extraordinary feat’

Following the release of exit poll results from Tuesday’s elections, which showed the Zionist Union and Likud neck-and-neck with 27 seats apiece, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared victory while Isaac Herzog hailed his party’s “extraordinary achievement” at the ballot boxes.

Addressing party members in Tel Aviv, Herzog vowed to make “every effort to form a government.”

“I want to establish a real and socialist government for Israel,” he said. “I call on all the socially conscious parties to unite with a government under my leadership which will be a government of reconciliation for Israel.”

Tzipi Livni, Herzog’s number 2, echoed her running mate, saying “we owe it to the public to make every effort to form a government under our leadership — under the leadership of Herzog.”

Netanyahu, whose Likud party rallied from a deficit in the polls to pull even with the Zionist Union, said his party “must form a strong and stable government which will attend to the welfare of the citizens of Israel.” He said he called on all leaders of nationalist parties to join him in forming a coalition.

Meretz head Zahava Gal-on, whose left-wing party was projected to win five seats, called on Herzog not to join a unity government with Netanyahu, saying it was still possible to form a center-left coalition.

Despite the Likud party’s projected winning of 27 or 28 seats, Joint List leader Ayman Odeh said that the Arab party achieved its aim of “bringing about the end of Benjamin Netanyahu’s regime.”

“We will prevent the right from building the next government,” political newcomer Odeh told the NRG website. His fellow MK Hanin Zoabi, however, said that Netanyahu would be the next prime minister.

Yair Lapid, whose Yesh Atid party was projected to win 12 seats, down from the 19 it took in the 2013 elections, said that it was a night of “great pride,” and that his party’s accomplishment “is proof… that Yesh Atid is a power that nobody can ignore anymore in Israeli society.”

Speaking to supporters in Tel Aviv, Lapid called for unity, saying that his party would fight “against politics of division and fragmentation, against the idea that the state is divided into tribes and each one works only for itself.” Lapid made no mention, however, of whether he’d seek to help form a unity government.

Moshe Kahlon, whose freshman party was projected to win as many as 10 seats, also expressed possible support for a unity government including his centrist faction.

“Now is the time to unite, not for fractions,” he told supporters at the party’s post-election celebration, the closest he came to making a statement on the subject.