Shelly Yacimovich and the Labor Party will work on joining a Center-Left
coalition to threaten the right-wing bloc, the party leader said on Tuesday
night, minutes after exit polls had her movement in a disappointing third place
with only 17 mandates.
“There is now an opportunity to free Israeli
citizens from the abuse of the Netanyahu government, and to do this we must work
seriously and discreetly, because the fate of the Israeli public depends on it,”
she said.
“I will do all I can and already started this morning to work
on a coalition based on social-economic issues and a diplomatic process,”
Yacimovich said.
She expressed her hope that a political revolution would
take place and the Netanyahu government would fall.
“There is no doubt
that a political drama is taking place before our eyes – the final results of
which we’ll see in the morning. There is a big chance for a revolution and the
end of the Netanyahu government,” she said.
Yacimovich’s statement was a
marked departure from earlier in the evening, when excitement gripped Labor
Party headquarters in Tel Aviv, where the feeling was the party would exceed
expectations that had it clocking around 17 seats, and would enter the 19th
Knesset as the second largest party.
At the time, Yacimovich said that
the party’s figures were showing that it would get more than 20 mandates, which
would allow it to put together the next government, presumably as part of a
Center-Left bloc.