As I surfed the news channels last night for reports on the Israeli election, the only two channels that seemed focused were BBC World News and France 24. Both reveled in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s “crushing defeat.” Exit polls, they claimed, showed Bibi’s opponent — Gadi Eisenkot –– and his party topping Likud, Bibi’s party, 52 seats to 50 (hardly crushing).
This morning, when I tuned into both channels once again, the only news I could find was a floating headline on BBC that said Netanyahu and his party had pulled ahead. The gushing joy in his “crushing defeat” was nowhere to be found. France 24 was virtually silent.
Anyway, nice to know that Europe has its “fake news” outlets as well as we do. Here, the coverage of the Israeli election, pre-voting, was all focused on the tens of thousands of American Israelis who were flying home to vote against Netanyahu.
Israeli politics are a bit complicated, but it appears that Netanyahu will have to form another coalition to remain in office. That might be harder to do this time around since the Arab-Israeli parties gained seats last night. It seems unlikely that they would throw their support behind either Netanyahu or Eisenkot.
While all this plays out, Bibi will remain Prime Minister. If he cannot form a coalition, a new election will have to be held.
Stay tuned.
