Israel’s Herzog accepts vote results, opens talks on forming a government

Netanyahu: letting Arab parties into gov’t will ‘dismantle’ Israel Israel’s President Isaac Herzog has accepted the certified results of last week’s parliamentary elections and begun consultations with party leaders on whom to task with forming the next government. The moves on Wednesday dealt a blow to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s efforts to discredit the vote, in which he and his allies lost their majority in the 120-member parliament, while Arab-led parties made historic gains. “The elections are over. Now is the time to face reality,” Herzog said. In the October 27 vote, neither Netanyahu’s coalition nor the bloc of his chief rival, opposition leader Gadi Eisenkot, secured the 61 seats required to govern.