Likud claims elections czar’s caution tape causing miscount

The Central Elections Committee is pushing back after the Likud party claimed that it is keeping observers from watching the final votes be counted at election headquarters.

Likud head Benjamin Netanyahu claimed in a social media post just before midnight that a cordon set up around tables where ballot counters are sitting was an “unprecedented” and “illegal” move that is keeping poll-watchers from being able to observe the count, alleging that there will be “mistakes and forgeries.”

CEC head Orly Adas responds that the cordon, a thin ribbon of caution tape, was set up to help with the orderly distribution of so-called double envelope ballots — those from soldiers, diplomats and others who were unable to vote at their normal polling stations. She slams “certain officials spreading unfounded rumors of irregularities.”

“Even before the counting of the double-envelopes began, we are already hearing certain officials calling for a recount, for a count that has yet to begin,” she says, according to Ynet.