Israel's Likud, Blue and White tie with 97.4% of vote counted
Confetti falls as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his wife Sara stand on stage after Netanyahu spoke following the announcement of exit polls in Israel's parliamentary election at the party headquarters in Tel Aviv, Israel April 10, 2019.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his main challenger, Benny Gantz, tied in the parliamentary elections on Wednesday morning after 97.4 percent of the votes were counted, official figures by Israeli Central Election Committee showed.
Both Netanyahu's Likud and Gantz's centrist party of Blue and White had 35 seats in the 120-seat parliament, or the Knesset, according to the figures.
Overall, the right-wing bloc won 65 seats and the center-left bloc lagged behind with 55 seats, indicating the long-serving right-wing leader was on course for forming the next coalition government.
The right-wing bloc includes the ultra-Orthodox parties of Shas and the United Torah Judaism, each with eight seats; the far-right parties of the United Right and Israel Our Home, each with five seats; and the party of Kulanu with four seats.
The center-left bloc includes the Arab parties of Hadash-Ta'al with six seats and Ra'am-Balad with four seats, the Labor party with six seats, and the left party of Meretz with four seats.
