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Elections in Israel – Jan 2013

Paz Itzhaki-Weinberger, 26-Jan-2013

Dear Friends & Colleagues,

Please find a very short analysis of the elections held in Israel and the results.

There were approx. 5.7 million citizens eligible to vote (out of approx. 8 million citizens).

Turnout was about 67.7% of the voters only.

The 120 places in the Knesset (The Israeli Parliament) will be divided as follows;

1. Likud - Benjamin Netanyahu (Right Wing)
31 Seats

2. The Jewish Home (Right Wing, National Religious and Conservative Jews)
12 seats

3. Labor party (Left-Center Wing)
15 seats

4. "Yesh Atid" - Yair Lapid (Center)
19 seats

5. Shas (Oriental Orthodox Jews)
11 seats

6. "Hatnua" - Zipi Livni (Center)
6 seats

7. Meretz (Left Wing)
6 seats

8. Arab parties
11 seats

9. Agudat Israel (Orthodox Western Jews)
7 seats

10. Kadima (Center) party
2 seats

My conclusions are:

Netanyahu is likely to stay prime minister for at least the next 1.5 years, but Israel might enter an era of political instability.

New elections might be held in a relative short period of 1.5 - 2 years from now.

The new expected coalition will be mainly right wing and center parties.

I’m anticipating all that now, before the new government has been formed.

No sign of forming a third Palestinian state in the near future besides the already 2 existing Palestinian states in the region: Gaza Strip (de facto Palestinian state) and Jordan (where 75% of the population is Palestinian).

Right now the Israeli currency (NIS - New Israeli Shekel) is very strong and stable and inflation and unemployment are very low, especially when compared to most European countries Israel's economy shows wonderful results.

For those of you who are interested in investing in Israel, most sectors in the Israeli real estate segment are somewhat expensive right now and chances exist for some price drops in assets prices in the future, but investments in hi-tech, agriculture, and mainly in sophisticated technologies including the energy sector might benefit the investors and yield superb results.

Paz.