Middle East News
Israel's Likud signs coalition deal with Jewish Home
Mar 25, 2009, 21:11 GMT
Tel Aviv - Another right-wing party joined the coalition of Israeli Prime Minister-designate Benjamin Netanyahu Wednesday evening, Israel Radio reported.
Netanyahu's hardline, but mainstream Likud party signed a coalition agreement with the pro-settler Jewish Home faction.
The party has three seats in the 120-seat Knesset, meaning Netanyahu now has a majority of 69 lawmakers in the Israeli parliament.
The Jewish Home will receive the science portfolio, the radio said.
Netanyahu hopes to present his government next Monday or Tuesday, some seven weeks after Israel's February 10 elections.
His Likud came in second, winning 27 seats in the Knesset, one fewer than the centrist Kadima party of outgoing Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni. He was nonetheless assigned by President Shimon Peres to form the next Israeli cabinet, because the right-wing bloc became a majority in the Knesset and the Likud leader was therefore in a better position to build the government than his main rival Livni.
His coalition currently comprises the Likud, the ultra-nationalist Israel Beitenu party of controversial Moldovan-born immigrant Avigdor Lieberman, the Labour Party of outgoing Defence Minister Ehud Barak, the ultra-Orthodox Shas and the Jewish Home.
The Labour Party dramatically voted for joining the Netanyahu government in a stormy meeting of its convention late Tuesday.
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