Israel Knesset rejects vote on dissolving itself

Netanyahu's coalition avoids early election amid conscription crisis, as Knesset rejects dissolution vote, giving more time for resolution.

Israel's parliament rejected early on Thursday (June 12, 2025) a preliminary vote to dissolve itself, the Knesset said in a statement, after an agreement was reached regarding a dispute over conscription.

The vote, which could have been a first step leading to an early election that polls show Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu would lose, was rejected with 61 lawmakers opposing it to 53 supporting it.

The Knesset consists of 120 seats, and the majority needed to pass the vote was 61 lawmakers.

This gives Mr. Netanyahu's ruling coalition further time to resolve its worst political crisis yet and avoid a ballot, which would be Israel's first since the eruption of the war with Hamas in Gaza.

Mr. Netanyahu has been pushing hard to resolve a deadlock in his coalition over a new military conscription bill, which has led to the present crisis.

"I am pleased to announce that after long discussions we have reached agreements on the principles on which the draft law will be based," Knesset's Foreign Affairs and Defence Committee Yuli Edelstein said in a statement.

Some religious parties in Netanyahu's coalition are seeking exemptions for ultra-Orthodox Jewish seminary students from military service that is mandatory in Israel, while other lawmakers want to scrap any such exemptions altogether.