Former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu made a comeback as he had a decisive victory in Israel's general elections, poll results showed on Thursday.
Prime Minister Yair Lapid called opposition leader Netanyahu to concede the race and congratulate him on his election victory, The Times of Israel reported.
All you need to know about Benjamin Netanyahu?
73-years-old Benjamin Netanyahu is an Israeli politician and diplomat who served Israel as its prime minister twice - 1996-99 and 2009-21. He also was the longest-serving prime minister since Israel’s independence.
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The son of Benzion Netanyahu, PM Benjamin Netanyahu, in 1963, moved to Philadelphia in the US. After enlisting in the Israeli military in 1967, he became a soldier in the elite special operations unit Sayeret Matkal and was also part of the team that rescued a hijacked jet plane at the Tel Aviv airport in 1972.
In the mid-1980s, Netanyahu became Israel's permanent representative to the United Nations and in 1988 returned to the country's political scene.
He entered the Israeli parliament for the right-wing conservative Likud party and became deputy foreign minister. In 1996, Netanyahu became prime minister for the first time, the youngest premier in Israel's history.
He served his second term as the prime minister for 12 consecutive years, from 2009-21, before being ousted in June 2021 by a cross-partisan coalition led by current PM Yair Lapid.
Now, cut to 2022, Netanyahu will control not just the largest party in the Knesset (Israeli parliament), but is poised to return to power leading a 64-strong majority bloc of his religious and right-wing allies in the 120-member Knesset.
READ | Israel Elections: Benjamin Netanyahu wins majority, PM Yair Lapid concedes defeat
Netanyahu's right-wing Likud party won 32 seats and his right-wing religious and nationalist bloc won 64 in the 120-seat parliament, or Knesset, according to Israel's Central Elections Committee.
Israelis recently headed to the ballots in the unprecedented fifth election since 2019, as the country's political system has been immobilized for almost four years. The parliament has 120 seats.
Over 6.7 million eligible voters cast their votes in 12,495 ballots, according to figures issued by the Central Elections Committee. Some 18,000 police officers were deployed throughout the country to prevent fraud attempts, manage traffic and keep security.
Netanyahu, Israel's longest-serving leader, sought to return to power with his right-wing Likud party and a far-right and Jewish ultra-Orthodox coalition.
