Israel’s Central Election Committee (CEC) on Tuesday rejected a request by parties in Netanyahu’s bloc to extend voting hours beyond 10pm, as turnout by 6pm reached its highest level on record, the Guardian reported, citing Haaretz.
Turnout stood at 66.7 per cent at 6pm, the highest ever recorded by that hour, the committee said. That was an increase of 9 per cent on the 2022 election at the same time.
Under Israeli law, voters who arrive at a polling station by 10pm can still cast their ballot after polls close.
Netanyahu’s Likud party had asked the electoral authorities earlier on Tuesday to extend voting. The main opposition party, Gadi Eisenkot’s Yashar, which is leading in the polls, said it firmly opposed any extension and called the request an attempt to “lay the groundwork for allegations challenging the integrity of the election”.
Netanyahu and his far-right allies had urged supporters during the day to turn out for a vote they claimed was being “stolen”, in what opposition described as a racist scare campaign.
Parties in the anti-Netanyahu bloc also filed several complaints with the committee on Tuesday. Yashar said it had contacted the CEC following reports that some of its ballot slips had been removed or damaged at polling stations, and Naftali Bennett’s Together (B’Yachad) party said it had received reports that an app was being used to monitor voters at polling stations in northern Israel. The Civil Election Guard, a volunteer group of election monitors, said ballot slips for the Haredi Public party had been removed from voting booths in ultra-Orthodox communities or hidden under other parties’ papers, according to Haaretz.
(with information from The Guardian)
