Posted on 03/17/2015 5:18:27 AM PDT by Dave346
Polls scheduled to close 10pm local time / 4pm EDT.
Turnout as of 9am was 7.4%, at 10am was 13.7%, and at 12pm was 26.5%.
Exit polls will be released when polls close in less than 8 hours.
For live coverage in English, click on link below:
(Excerpt) Read more at i24news.tv ...
ROTFL.
Shelly Yachimovich, No. 3 on the Zionist Union list (behind Herzog and Livni) uses facebook to accuse the PM of being “racist” over warnings over the foreign funds being used to bus Arabs to the polls (while the Arabs themselves bragged about their turnout being way up this morning).
15:41
Answering a question from a voter on Facebook, Yachimovich says: “No Western leader would dare utter such a racist comment. Imagine a prime minister/president in any democracy who would warn that his rule is in jeopardy because, e.g., ‘Black voters are coming in droves to the polling stations’… Horrendous, isn’t it? In any case, I think what worries Bibi is that Israeli citizens are moving in droves to the ballots, and quite simply want to democratically topple him.”
18:52
Voter turnout hits 54.6% at 6 p.m.
Turnout at 6 p.m. hits 54.6 percent of eligible voters, 0.9 points below the number in 2013 at that hour.
Polls close throughout the country at 10 p.m.
Turnout by 6pm was 55.5% in 2013 and 50.3% in 2009.
Turnout at 6 PM 54.6% vs 55.5 in 2013. Down slihghtly. What does it mean? Foreign (OBAMA) funds being used to bus Arab voters to the polls? Surprise meter at zero. How Dingy Harry, the Pirate, beat Sharon Angle in 2010. Dubious Union voters being bussed to the polls.
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/192781
Netanyahu responded furiously to the ruling banning the press conference he had planned to hold at the Prime Minister’s Residence.
“The ‘anyone but Bibi (Netanyahu)’ party doesn’t stop talking without any interference,” Netanyahu said angrily, referencing Labor. “The only one who they decided to forbid speaking is me - the prime minister from the Likud.”
Netanyahu vowed “no one will silence me.”
Yup, when Bibi wins his 4th term, it will be fun to watch the wailing and gnashing of the leftist press as the “tens of millions” in foreign funding to attempt to overthrow Bibi won’t do squat!
Netanyahu is pissed and worried. Seems like there would be hell to pay if these Labor folks try to put the “Arab List” in their coalition. Even folks who may be voting for Labor might have a problem with that
Amen to all prayers
Usually a lower turnout means Conservatives voting in the USA, but what does it mean in Israel?
At the start of the day much of the Israeli press was predicting turnout around 80%, which they reminded us hasn’t been seen since Netanyahu was defeated in 1999.
Right now it they are behind the pace of 2013 which came out to 66.6%.
Could mean anything, but given the massive infusion of foreign money to try to turn out the left, it can only be a good thing I reckon.
Me thinks the Israelis, unlike the Americans understand the threats from Iran / Syria / Hamas / Hezbollah, etc so all the money and buses in the world won’t change the outcome. And furthermore, vote fraud is much harder there than it is here.
Only CBS Points Out Top Obama Aide Is Working to Defeat Netanyahu
vote fraud is much harder there than it is here.
Still surprised, but shouldn’t be, that Obama’s gang has the gall to butt into an Israeli election. He is SO a Muslim.
bkmk
19:22
In Internet video, PM blasts broadcast restrictions
“All day politicians have been speaking in the media,” Netanyahu protests.
Netanyahu had convened a press conference at the Prime Minister’s Residence in Jerusalem, but Israeli media was forbidden from broadcasting his appearance. Under Israeli election law, electioneering is not allowed on Election Day.
Netanyahu protests that left-wing politicians have been appearing in the media for much of the day.
“Tzipi [Livni], Boujie [Herzog], Yair [Lapid], representatives of the left, spoke in every possible studio and conducted flagrant electioneering,” he charges at the press conference, which was not broadcast in Israeli media, but a video was uploaded to Netanyahu’s Facebook page.
“The ‘Just not Bibi’ party doesn’t stop speaking in the media without anyone disturbing them. The only one they decided to prohibit from speaking in the media is me, the Likud prime minister,” he charges in the most direct accusation leveled by the prime minister against Central Election Committee chairman Supreme Court Justice Salim Joubran, who made the decision to nix the broadcast.
“No one will shut us up,” he vows. “In a democratic state, even a Likud prime minister has the right to say his piece.”
I pray that the Israelies are not about to make a bigger mistake than we did in 2008.
19:34
Likud is losing, warns Netanyahu
The ruling Likud party is losing the election, Netanyahu warns.
In a press statement uploaded to his Facebook page — electioneering is forbidden in Israel’s formal media outlets on Election Day — Netanyahu paints a dire picture meant to mobilize right-wing voters to the polls.
“We’re in a fateful campaign. There is still a meaningful gap between Labor and Likud. The only way to shrink the gap is to go to the ballot box and vote ‘Mahal,’” Netanyahu says, a reference to the letter-based symbols on Likud’s election slip.
Netanyahu blames foreign government and left-wing NGOs for the left’s improved showing in this election.
“The gap between Labor and Likud is based primarily on foreign funds that flow in vast quantities to leftist NGOs. Its purpose is to replace a Likud government headed by me with a left government supported by the Arab list,” he says
Ayman Odeh, chair of the Arab Joint List, figures large in Netanyahu’s warning to the right.
“Ayman Odeh, who supports [Zionist Union leader Isaac] Herzog, has already said not only that I must be replaced, but that I should be put in prison for defending the citizens of Israel and the lives of IDF soldiers [during last summer’s Gaza war]…. A left government that depends on such a list will surrender at every step, on Jerusalem, the 1967 lines, on everything,” Netanyahu rails, “and therefore there’s an immense effort of leftist NGOs to mobilize voters from the left bloc, primarily in the Arab sector, and in areas where leftists vote.”
Netanyahu’s warnings of high Arab turnout have been roundly condemned by the left and center earlier throughout the day. He addresses the criticism in his statement.
“I want to clarify: there is nothing illegitimate with citizens voting, Jewish or Arab, as they see fit. What is not legitimate is the funding, the fact that money comes from abroad from NGOs and foreign governments, brings them en masse to the ballot box in an organized fashion, in favor of the left, gives undue power to the extremist Arab list, and weakens the right bloc in such a way that we will be unable to build a government — despite the fact that most citizens of Israel support the national camp and support me as the prime minister from Likud.”
Welcome to Chicago, Mr Prime Minister
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