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All 120 seats in the Knesset 61 seats needed for a majority | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Turnout | 78.58% ( 3.08pp) | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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This lists parties that won seats. See the complete results below.
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Legislative elections were held in Israel on 31 December 1973. Voter turnout was 79%. [1] The election was postponed for two months because of the Yom Kippur War.
The table below lists the parliamentary factions represented in the 7th Knesset.
| Name | Ideology | Symbol | Leader | 1969 result | Seats at 1972 dissolution | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Votes (%) | Seats | ||||||
| Alignment | Social Democracy Labor Zionism | אמת | Golda Meir | 46.2% | 56 / 120 | 56 / 120 | |
| Gahal | National liberalism | חל | Menachem Begin | 21.7% | 26 / 120 | 26 / 120 | |
| Mafdal | Religious Zionism | ב | Yosef Burg | 9.7% | 12 / 120 | 12 / 120 | |
| Agudat Yisrael | Religious conservatism | ג | Yehuda Meir Abramowicz | 3.2% | 4 / 120 | 4 / 120 | |
| Independent Liberals | Liberalism | לע | Moshe Kol | 3.2% | 4 / 120 | 4 / 120 | |
| National List | Social liberalism | עמ | Yigal Hurvitz | 3.1% | 4 / 120 | 4 / 120 | |
| Rakah | Communism Socialism | ו | Meir Vilner | 2.8% | 3 / 120 | 3 / 120 | |
| Progress and Development | Arab satellite list | רא | Seif el-Din el-Zoubi | 2.1% | 2 / 120 | 2 / 120 | |
| Poalei Agudat Yisrael | Religious conservatism | ד | Kalman Kahana | 1.9% | 2 / 120 | 2 / 120 | |
| Arab List for Bedouin and Villagers | Arab satellite list | עא | Hamad Abu Rabia | 1.4% | 2 / 120 | 2 / 120 | |
| Meri | Socialism | ש | Uri Avnery | 1.2% | 2 / 120 | 2 / 120 | |
| Free Centre | Liberalism | ט | Shmuel Tamir | 1.2% | 2 / 120 | 2 / 120 | |
| Maki | Communism | ק | Moshe Sneh | 1.1% | 1 / 120 | 1 / 120 | |
| Party | Votes | % | Seats | +/– | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Alignment | 621,183 | 39.65 | 51 | −5 | |
| Likud | 473,309 | 30.21 | 39 | +7 | |
| National Religious Party | 130,349 | 8.32 | 10 | −2 | |
| Religious Torah Front | 60,012 | 3.83 | 5 | −1 | |
| Independent Liberals | 56,560 | 3.61 | 4 | 0 | |
| Rakah | 53,353 | 3.41 | 4 | +1 | |
| Ratz | 35,023 | 2.24 | 3 | New | |
| Progress and Development | 22,604 | 1.44 | 2 | 0 | |
| Moked | 22,147 | 1.41 | 1 | 0 | |
| Arab List for Bedouin and Villagers | 16,408 | 1.05 | 1 | New | |
| Black Panthers | 13,332 | 0.85 | 0 | New | |
| The League List | 12,811 | 0.82 | 0 | New | |
| Meri | 10,469 | 0.67 | 0 | −1 | |
| Movement for Social Equality | 10,202 | 0.65 | 0 | New | |
| Cooperation and Brotherhood | 9,949 | 0.63 | 0 | −2 | |
| Blue White Panthers | 5,945 | 0.38 | 0 | New | |
| Brotherhood Movement | 4,433 | 0.28 | 0 | New | |
| Israeli Arab List | 3,269 | 0.21 | 0 | New | |
| Yemenite List | 3,195 | 0.20 | 0 | New | |
| Socialist Revolution List | 1,201 | 0.08 | 0 | New | |
| Popular Movement | 1,101 | 0.07 | 0 | New | |
| Total | 1,566,855 | 100.00 | 120 | 0 | |
| Valid votes | 1,566,855 | 97.86 | |||
| Invalid/blank votes | 34,243 | 2.14 | |||
| Total votes | 1,601,098 | 100.00 | |||
| Registered voters/turnout | 2,037,478 | 78.58 | |||
| Source: IDI, Nohlen et al. | |||||
Golda Meir of the Alignment formed the sixteenth government on 10 March 1974, including the National Religious Party and the Independent Liberals in her coalition, with 22 ministers. Meir resigned on 11 April 1974 after the Agranat Commission had published its interim report on the Yom Kippur War.
The Alignment's Yitzhak Rabin formed the seventeenth government on 3 June 1974, including Ratz, the Independent Liberals, Progress and Development and the Arab List for Bedouins and Villagers. The new government had 19 ministers. The National Religious Party joined the coalition on 30 October and Ratz left on the 6 November, by which time there were 21 ministers.
The government resigned on 22 December 1976, after ministers of the National Religious Party were sacked because the party had abstained from voting on a motion of no confidence, which had been brought by Agudat Yisrael over a breach of the Sabbath on an Israeli Air Force base.
During the Knesset term there were several defections from parties; In 1975 Aryeh Eliav left the Alignment and merged with Ratz to form Ya'ad - Civil Rights Movement. The new party broke up the following year when Eliav and Marcia Freedman left to set up the Independent Socialist Faction, whilst Shulamit Aloni and Boaz Moav returned to Ratz. In 1975 Benjamin Halevi left Likud to sit as an independent, whilst Shmuel Tamir and Akiva Nof left Likud to form the Free Centre the following year. [2] In 1977 Hillel Seidel defected from the Independent Liberals to Likud, whilst Mordechai Ben-Porat broke away from the Alignment and sat as an independent. [2]
In February 1974 Progress and Development and the Arab List for Bedouins and Villagers merged into the Alignment (with which they were already associated), but both later broke away and then formed the United Arab List in 1977. In the build-up to the 1977 elections the Religious Torah Front broke up into Agudat Yisrael (three seats) and Poalei Agudat Yisrael in March 1977. On 10 April Mapam broke away from the Alignment, but rejoined it two days later. [2]
Shinui was a Zionist, secular, and anti-clerical free market liberal party and political movement in Israel. The party twice became the third-largest in the Knesset, but both occasions were followed by a split and collapse; in 1977, the party won 15 seats as part of the Democratic Movement for Change, but the alliance split in 1978, and Shinui was reduced to two seats at the next elections. In 2003, the party won 15 seats alone, but lost them all three years later after most of its MKs left to form new parties. The party was a member of Liberal International until 2009.
Ratz, officially the Movement for Civil Rights and Peace was a left-wing political party in Israel that focused on human rights, civil rights, and women's rights. It was active from 1973 until its formal merger into Meretz in 1997. However, it remains a registered political party.
The Democratic Movement for Change, commonly known by its Hebrew acronym Dash, was a short-lived and initially highly successful centrist political party in Israel. Formed in 1976 by numerous well-known non-politicians, it ceased to exist two years later.
Elections for the fifth Knesset were held in Israel on 15 August 1961. Voter turnout was 81.6%.
Elections for the sixth Knesset were held in Israel on 2 November 1965. Voter turnout was 85.9%.
Legislative elections were held in Israel on 17 May 1977 to elect the ninth Knesset. For the first time in Israeli political history, the right wing, led by Likud, won a plurality of seats, ending almost 30 years of rule by the left-wing Alignment and its predecessor, Mapai. The dramatic shift in Israeli politics caused by the outcome led to it becoming known as "the revolution", a phrase coined by TV anchor Haim Yavin when he announced the election results live on television with the words "Ladies and gentlemen—a revolution!". The election saw the beginning of a period lasting almost two decades where the left- and right-wing blocs held roughly equal numbers of seats in the Knesset.
The Alignment was the name of two political alliances in Israel, both of which ended their existence by merging into the Israeli Labor Party.
Knesset elections were held in Israel on 30 June 1981. The ruling Likud won one more seat than the opposition Alignment, in line with many polls which had predicted a tight race. Voter turnout was 78.5%, with Likud receiving around ten thousand more than the Alignment. This elections highlighted the polarization in the country.
Legislative elections were held in Israel on 23 July 1984 to elect the eleventh Knesset. Voter turnout was 78.8%. The results saw the Alignment return to being the largest party in the Knesset, a status it had lost in 1977. However, the party could not form a government with any of the smaller parties, resulting in a grand coalition government with Likud, with both party leaders, Shimon Peres and Yitzhak Shamir, holding the post of Prime Minister for two years each.
Elections for the 12th Knesset were held in Israel on 1 November 1988. Voter turnout was 79.7%.
Elections for the 13th Knesset were held in Israel on 23 June 1992. The election resulted in the formation of a Labor government, led by Yitzhak Rabin, helped by the failure of several small right wing parties to pass the electoral threshold. Voter turnout was 77%.
The eighteenth government of Israel was formed by Menachem Begin on 20 June 1977, following the May 1977 elections. It was the first government in Israeli political history led by a right-wing party, with the coalition consisting of Begin's Likud, the National Religious Party and Agudat Yisrael. Begin's government also contained Moshe Dayan who had been elected to the Knesset on the Alignment's list. Following Dayan's acceptance of a place in the cabinet, he was expelled from the party and sat as an independent MK, though he only remained in the cabinet for four months.
The sixteenth government of Israel was formed by Golda Meir on 10 March 1974, following the December 1973 elections. However, following Meir's resignation as Prime Minister on 11 April, it only remained in office until 3 June, and at just 85 days, was the shortest-lived government in Israeli political history.
The seventeenth government of Israel was formed by Yitzhak Rabin on 3 June 1974, following the resignation of Prime Minister Golda Meir on 11 April and Rabin's election as Labor Party leader on 26 April. It was the first time an Israeli government had been led by a native-born Israeli.
The twenty-first government of Israel was formed by Shimon Peres of the Alignment on 13 September 1984, following the July elections. With both the Alignment and Likud winning over 40 seats each, neither side could form a stand-alone coalition, resulting in a national unity government, together with the National Religious Party, Agudat Yisrael, Shas, Morasha, Shinui and Ometz, which together held 97 of the 120 seats in the Knesset. However, in protest at the alliance with Likud, Mapam broke away from the Alignment, as did Yossi Sarid, who joined Ratz.
The Left Camp of Israel was a left-wing political party in Israel. It was also known as Sheli, an acronym for "Peace for Israel".
Municipal elections took place in Israel on 31 December 1973, having been delayed from their original date on 30 October because of the Yom Kippur War. They were the last municipal elections to take place on the date of a legislative election, and the first in which the newly formed Likud participated.
