Israeli presidential election - 10 June 2014

[Famous Mortimer]

Elected by parliament in 2 rounds.

Round 1:

Reuven Rivlin (Likud) 44
Meir Sheetrit (Hatnuah) 31
Dalia Itzik (Kadima) 28
Dalia Dorner (Independent) 13
Dan Shechtman (Independent) 1

Round 2:

Reuven Rivlin (Likud) 63
Meir Sheetrit (Hatnuah) 53

Labor candidate Binyamin Ben-Eliezer dropped out just before the race because of corruption allegations. That's why the left was particularly divided and why Hatnuah and Kadima briefly became relevant again.

Brief summaries of the candidates:

Reuven Rivlin is a former Speaker of the Knesset up until this term when he was ousted in favor of someone more loyal to Netanyahu. He and Netanyahu have bad blood but apparently not so bad that Likud didn't back Rivlin, or maybe Netanyahu saw kicking him to this ceremonial post as a good way to get rid of him. Rivlin is an ideological weirdo. He backs annexing the West Bank and giving citizenship to Palestinians living there, he is also on good terms with the Arab parties and opposes raising the electoral threshold (which would primarily hurt those parties) but he's generic right-wing on a lot of other issues.

Meir Sheetrit is a Sephardic former Likud member and failed leadership candidate. He was also a member and failed leadership candidate of Kadima and briefly flirted with leading the Pensioners Party before he joined up with Tzipi Livni. I'm unsure where his backing came from. I can't find too many public endorsements. Presumably everyone in Hatnuah backed him. He also probably got votes from Labor and maybe Likudniks who didn't like Rivlin?

Dalia Itzik is a former Knesset Speaker and former member of Labor (Peres protege) and Kadima. In addition to being backed by the two members of her own party, I'm guessing she also got a lot of support from mainstream Labor members. Several articles point out that she was nominated (candidates need to be nominated by 10 members of the Knesset) by members of Yesh Atid and Shas, although I don't know which ones specifically.

Dalia Dorner is a former supreme court justice. She was backed by Meretz chairwoman Zahava Gal-On and presumably the rest of Meretz. Labor left-winger Stav Shaffir also endorsed her after Ben-Eliezer dropped out.

Dan Shechtman is a Nobel Laureate in Chemistry. I'm unsure how he got 10 nominations. I guess nominations don't always equal endorsements.

Anyway, I could be wrong, but I think Rivlin becomes the first member of the current Knesset to end his term early. Karmel Shama, a Likud moderate and ally of economic populist Moshe Kahlon, takes his place as the next person on the Likud list.