8:36 PM Israel time: It’s about an hour and a half until the big announcement of the exit polling and it’s the time when you watch the news and try to figure out what the journalists aren’t telling you – because they know the results but aren’t allowed to announce them yet.
The hints we’re getting – it’s going to be a long night – and that means it’s going to be close. The TV reporters keep referring to coffee and caffeine and staying up late.
On Channel 2 now, the political reporters are saying that even though Israel has a parliamentary system where you vote for a party – not for an individual – that the voters were treating this election like direct personal elections – people voted for Bibi, Tsippi, Lieberman, or Barak, not paying great attention to who else was on the party list – that is if they even knew who they were. A reporter said that Meretz made a mistake in trying to sell the party, not the man at the top of the ticket (another hint – pretty clear Meretz is going to get trounced – but you don’t need inside info to figure that out, just anecdotal evidence – former Meretz voters either moved right to support Livni, or moved left to Hadash or sideways to the Green Party.)
Join the Conversation
VIP members get the ability to comment on articles.