With 99% of ballots counted, Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud and its far-right and ultra-Orthodox allies won 53 seats in the 120-seat Knesset.

The opposing bloc holds 48 seats from former military chief Gadi Eisenkot’s right-wing and center-left factions and a record 19 seats from the two Arab-dominated parties. The new Knesset convenes on November 10 and President Isaac Herzog is expected to give Eisenkot — whose Yashar is the largest in the anti-Netanyahu bloc — the mandate to form a government, while caretaker Netanyahu faces no special legal restrictions on military operations and could legally authorize an attack on Iran despite lacking a parliamentary majority, subject to ordinary procedures.