BICOM

According to reports in Yedioth Ahronoth this morning, senior Likud members say Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is holding consultations about moving elections up to this autumn, and is coordinating with senior coalition members and opposition leaders‫.

‎One senior Likud MK who suggests that the 18th Knesset is likely to end its term long before the official date for elections in November 2013, is Knesset Speaker Reuven Rivlin. ‘‎I believe that Israel is in an election year and that the Knesset’‎s summer session, which will open on Monday, will be the last session of the 18th Knesset, since the next elections will be held this year,’ ‎he told Yedioth Ahronoth yesterday. Rivlin said that difficulties to reach agreements on the 2013 budget, due to clashes between social and defence priorities would be the primary rationale behind elections. The government’s desire to hold elections before presidential elections in the US may also prompts early elections in Israel.

Similar statements were made yesterday by other senior Likud members who said that even if Netanyahu preferred not holding elections soon, there would be no choice but to dissolve the Knesset at the end of this session. ‘It’s obvious to everyone that the elections will be quite soon, and that it is better that the government initiate them rather than be dragged into them’, said one Likud member in the Yedioth Ahronoth report.

Netanyahu faces an uphill struggle with his coalition on the budget and Tal Law, a law that exempts ultra-Orthodox men from military service. Following a Supreme Court ruling deeming the law unconstitutional, the government has been asked to legislate a new law by August. The legislation process may prompt fissures within the coalition and Netanyahu may want to preempt a coalition crisis with an announcement of elections.