2001 Israeli prime ministerial election

Elections for Prime Minister were held in Israel on 6 February 2001 following the resignation of the incumbent, Labour's Ehud Barak. Barak stood for re-election against Likud's Ariel Sharon.

It was the third and last Prime Ministerial election (separate elections were scrapped before the next elections in 2003), and the only one which was not held alongside simultaneous Knesset elections.

Voter turnout was 62.3%, the lowest turnout for any national election held in Israel. The low turnout was at least partially due to many Israeli Arabs boycotting the poll in protest at the October 2000 events in which 12 Israeli Arabs were killed by the police. Other possible reasons are Sharon's massive advantage in advance polls, and the lack of enthusiasm of Barak supporters due to his perceived failings—notably, the failure of the 2000 Camp David talks with the Palestinians, and the "turbine affair" in which Barak yielded to the religious parties' pressure, violating previous promises.

Results

Candidate	Party	Votes	%
Ariel Sharon	Likud	1,698,077	62.4%
Ehud Barak	Labour	1,023,944	37.6%
Total		2,722,021	100%

In addition to the 2,722,021 valid votes, there were 83,917 invalid ballots, 3.0% of the total.

Aftermath

After winning the election, Sharon needed to form a government in the Knesset. However, because there had been no Knesset elections, Labour remained the largest party.

The result was a national unity government involving eight parties; Labour, Likud, Shas, the Centre Party, the National Religious Party, United Torah Judaism, Yisrael BaAliyah, the National Union and Yisrael Beiteinu. The government initially had 26 ministers, though this later rose to 29, the largest number in Israeli political history.

New Knesset elections were called in 2003, which resulted in a landslide victory for Sharon's Likud.

External links

• 2001 Election for Prime Minister on the Knesset website (in English)