Israel’s polling stations had recorded a 57.7 percent turnout as of 6 p.m. local time, more than six percent higher than in the previous election and the highest figure since the 1999 election.
According to the Director General of the Central Elections Committee, Orly Ades, some 3.9 million Israelis have already gone to the polls, a figure significantly higher than in the last elections. Among the Armed Forces, the percentage is over 65 percent.
However, the turnout among the Arab population is not as high, and the latest figures show that 30 percent have cast their vote at the ballot box. «We would like to clarify that reliable data on the participation of Arab citizens has never been published before,» the aChord Center of the Hebrew University stressed.
Israel is holding its fifth elections since 2019 on Tuesday, a polls in which one of the main points of interest lies with former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (1996 – 199 and 2009 – 2021) and his aspirations to retake the head of government.
In fact, in a last attempt to mobilize voters, Netanyahu, leader of the Likud party, has shared on his social networks images of supposed lines of citizens waiting to vote, according to the local newspaper ‘The Times of Israel’.
However, verification reports point out that the images correspond to the 2019 vote, the year in which he shared the same snapshots.
For his part, the Prime Minister, Yair Lapid, has released a video in which he assures that «as expected», the results are «very, very even». Netanyahu has also expressed himself along the same lines. «The (presidential) race is very close,» he said.
