By Anees Barghouthy
JERUSALEM
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Tuesday that he would phone leader of right-wing Jewish Home party Naftali Bennett for talks on the formation of a coalition government following the parliamentary polls, currently underway in Israel.
"Bennett is a major partner in any government I will form," Netanyahu, leader of right-wing Likud party, said after casting his ballot in in the Paula Ben Gurion school in Jerusalem on Tuesday.
"The first one to call after the elections is Miriam Peretz," he said, referring to the mother of two soldiers who were killed in Israel's wars in Lebanon and Gaza. "And the second one is Nafatli Bennett to start setting up a nationalist camp," Netanyahu added.
Netanyahu stressed that he has no plans to form a coalition government with the Zionist Union, an alliance between the centrist Labor and Hatnuah parties led by MK Isaac Herzog and former Justice Minister Tzipi Livni respectively.
"There will be no unity government with Labor," he said. "I will form a nationalist government."
Israelis started Tuesday to flock to polling stations across the self-proclaimed Jewish state to elect a new Knesset amid a dead heat between the incumbent Likud party and the center-left Zionist Union alliance.
Israel's official electoral commission said the number of eligible voters for the 20th Knesset vote stood at 5,881,696, who would cast their ballots at 10,372 polling stations nationwide.
Twenty-five lists are competing in the election, but opinion polls indicate that only 11 of these will likely exceed the 3.25-percent electoral threshold.
According to Israeli law, Election Day is an official holiday, on which polling stations open at 7am and close at 10pm.
Official election results will be announced Thursday, according to the electoral commission.
