Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu handed back the mandate to form a government to President Reuven Rivlin on Monday after he failed to form a ruling coalition within the 28-day deadline
TEL AVIV (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 21st October, 2019) Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu handed back the mandate to form a government to President Reuven Rivlin on Monday after he failed to form a ruling coalition within the 28-day deadline.After neither of the parties managed to secure the required 61-seat majority in the September 17 general election, Rivlin tasked Likud party leader Netanyahu with forming a coalition government.
"I received Prime Minister MK Benjamin Netanyahu's announcement that he is returning the mandate to form the government because he was unable to do [so]," Rivlin wrote on Twitter.
The president added that in accordance with the law, he now intended to transfer the mandate to the chairman of the Blue and White alliance, Benny Gantz, and give him 28 days to build a coalition government.
Netanyahu, who turned 70 on Monday, has been at the government's helm for 10 years. He became the longest-serving prime minister in Israeli history in June, beating the record set by the Jewish state's founding father, David Ben-Gurion.
