51 MKs Back Lapid For PM, Including Right-Wing New Hope, As Rivlin Resumes Talks

Gideon Sa’ar’s New Hope party said Wednesday that it would tell President Reuven Rivlin that it recommends that Yesh Atid party leader Yair Lapid form the next government, greatly increasing the opposition chief’s chances of being handed the mandate after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu failed to muster a majority coalition in his allocated time.

In the previous round of consultations with Rivlin last month, Sa’ar’s six-member party didn’t back anyone as premier. That has now boosted Lapid’s bloc of backers from 45 to 51, including Yesh Atid, Blue and White, Labor, Meretz and Yisrael Beytenu.

All those parties backed Lapid as prime minister when they met Rivlin for consultations aimed at deciding whom to task with forming a new government, a day after Netanyahu announced that he had failed.

Read more at Times of Israel.

{Matzav.com}