Elections in Israel are based on nationwide proportional representation. The electoral threshold is currently set at 2%, with the number of seats a party receives in the Knesset being proportional to the number of votes it receives. The Knesset is elected for a four-year term, although most governments have not served a full term and early elections are a frequent occurrence. Israel has a multi-party system based on coalition governments as no party has ever won a majority of seats in a national election, although the Alignment briefly held a majority following its formation by an alliance of several different parties prior to the 1969 elections. The legal voting age for Israeli citizens is eighteen. Elections are overseen by the Central Elections Committee and are held according to the Knesset Elections Law.

National elections for the Knesset are held once every four years, though early elections have occurred. Early elections can be called by a vote of the majority of Knesset members, or by an edict of the President, and normally occur on occasions of political stalemate and inability of the government to get the parliament's support for its policy. Failure to get the annual budget bill approved by the Knesset by March 31 (3 months after the start of the fiscal year) also leads automatically to early elections.

Coordinates: 31°N 35°E / 31°N 35°E / 31; 35

Israel, officially the State of Israel ( /ˈɪzriːəl/ or  /ˈɪzreɪəl/; Hebrew: מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל‎, Medīnat Yisrā'el, IPA: [me̞diˈnät jisʁäˈʔe̞l] ( listen); Arabic: دَوْلَة إِسْرَائِيل‎, Dawlat Isrāʼīl, IPA: [dawlat ʔisraːˈʔiːl]), is a parliamentary republic in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea. It borders Lebanon in the north, Syria in the northeast, Jordan and the West Bank in the east, Egypt and the Gaza Strip on the southwest, and the Gulf of Aqaba in the Red Sea to the south, and it contains geographically diverse features within its relatively small area. Israel is defined as a Jewish and Democratic State in its Basic Laws and is the world's only Jewish-majority state.

Following the adoption of a resolution by the General Assembly of the United Nations on 29 November 1947 recommending the adoption and implementation of the United Nations plan to partition Palestine, on 14 May 1948 David Ben-Gurion, the Executive Head of the World Zionist Organization and president of the Jewish Agency for Palestine, declared the establishment of a Jewish state in Eretz Israel, to be known as the State of Israel, a state independent from the British Mandate for Palestine. Neighboring Arab states invaded the next day in support of the Palestinian Arabs. Israel has since fought several wars with neighboring Arab states, in the course of which it has occupied the West Bank, Sinai Peninsula, Gaza Strip and the Golan Heights. Portions of these territories, including east Jerusalem, have been annexed by Israel, but the border with the neighboring West Bank has not yet been permanently defined.^{[neutrality is disputed]} Israel has signed peace treaties with Egypt and Jordan, but efforts to resolve the Israeli–Palestinian conflict have so far not resulted in peace.

 Limor Livnat (help·info) (Hebrew: לימור לבנת‎, born 22 September 1950) is an Israeli politician who currently serves as a member of the Knesset for Likud, and as the country's Minister of Culture & Sport.

Born in Haifa, Livnat is the only member of Knesset not to have a secondary education. She barely made ends meet working in advertising and had to rely on financial handouts from her parents.

She first entered the Knesset on 14 April 1992, shortly before the 1992 elections, as a replacement for Haim Corfu. She retained her seat in the election, and in her first term served as chairwoman of the Committee for the Advancement of the Status of Women, the Subcommittee on Laws of Personal Status and the Parliamentary Committee for Investigating Murder of Women by their Spouses.

She retained her seat in the 1996 elections, and was appointed Minister of Communications in Binyamin Netanyahu's government. During her term, she attempted to increase competition in the Israeli communications sector by weakening and privatizing Bezeq, which had previously held a monopoly over the country's landline phone sector.

Tzachi Hanegbi (Hebrew: צחי הנגבי‎, born 26 February 1957) is a prominent Israeli lawmaker and security expert. Hanegbi was the Chairman of the Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee at the Knesset. Among the top cabinet positions he previously held are Minister of Justice, Minister of Internal Security and Minister of Intelligence and Nuclear Affairs. Hanegbi was also the minister in charge of Israel's strategic and security relations with the United States, and the minister in the Prime Minister's office supervising Israel's intelligence agencies – Mossad and Shin Bet – and overseeing Israel's Atomic Energy Agency.

Yitzhak (Tzachi) Hanegbi was born in Jerusalem in 1957. His mother is Geula Cohen, a prominent member of the 1940s underground group Lehi and later MK for Likud and Tehiya. His father, Immanuel Hanegbi, was the Operations Officer for the Lehi. After his military service in the paratroopers corps, Hanegbi studied international relations at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. As president of the Hebrew University Student Union in 1980, he received a six-month suspended sentence for quarrelling with Arab terrorists.^{[citation needed]} Despite this incident, he became president of the National Union of Israeli Students later that year, holding that title until 1982. After his undergraduate studies, he went on to study law, obtaining an LL.B.