JERUSALEM – Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel pledged Wednesday to work quickly to form a new government after his clear-cut election victory as Isaac Herzog, the center-left opposition leader, conceded defeat.
“Our country’s everyday reality doesn’t give us the luxury for delay,” Netanyahu of the conservative party Likud said in a statement.
“The citizens of Israel rightfully expect that we will act quickly and responsibly to establish a leadership that will work for them in areas of defense, the economy and society just as we promised in this campaign – and just like we will now set ourselves toward doing,” he added.
The new government will probably be made up mostly of right-wing and Orthodox parties.
The prospect of a right-wing government prompted a hostile response from the Palestinian leadership, which has been inflamed by Netanyahu’s provocative campaigning tactics, including a reversal of his support for the establishment of a Palestinian state and scaremongering about the high turnout of Israeli Arab voters.
“The results of the Israeli elections show the success of a campaign platform based on settlements, racism, apartheid and the denial of the fundamental human rights of the Palestinian people,” Saeb Erekat, the longtime chief Palestinian negotiator, said.
“Such a result would not have been possible had the international community held Israel to account for its systematic violations of international law,” he added.
Expecting continued confrontation between Netanyahu and the Palestinian Authority of President Mahmoud Abbas, whose relations have been in a downward spiral since the breakdown of U.S.-brokered negotiations last year, Erekat added: “Now, more than ever, the international community must act. It must rally behind Palestinian efforts to internationalize our struggle for dignity and freedom through the International Criminal Court and through all other peaceful means.”
