Israel’s election rhetoric: What candidates said, and how they performed

Israel’s parliamentary election on Tuesday produced no clear winner, with nearly 90 percent of ballots counted and both major political blocs falling short of the 61 seats needed to form a government. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s bloc is on course to win 53 seats in the 120-member Knesset, while the opposition bloc led by Gadi Eisenkot is expected to secure 48 seats. The Arab-majority parties won 19 seats, a historic high, driven by record turnout among Palestinian citizens of Israel of about 80 percent. That has placed the Arab parties at the centre of coalition arithmetic, even as several party leaders ruled out governing with them. So what did the main contenders say in the run-up to and during the vote, and how did they fare?