See updates being added below.
I strongly encourage all registered Kadima voters to get out there and vote. You tiny little fraction of the people are essentially deciding the Prime Minister for the country, as well as the leader for your party. Don’t be complacent, don’t let the “all the polls are saying this person will win, or this person is going to lose” keep you from casting your vote because you think the election is sewn up without you. Make your voice heard with your vote.
For good or bad, the rest of the country is relying on you and your decision. Don’t let us down by not making a decision and staying away from the polls. Please go vote.
Update 4:40: Mofaz is going to win if the voter turn-out continues to be this low. Only 19% of registered Kadima voters have bothered to vote so far. If you are registered as a Kadima voter and you do not want Mofaz as our next Prime Minister, I suggest you go to the polling station NOW and cast your vote for someone else. If not then I don’t want to hear you bitch about who is leading the country. You don’t use your voting rights, you lose your right to bitch.
Update 8p.m.: Voting hours extended to 10:30 p.m.* Go vote!! Not even 30% of registered voters have voted. Do you want to leave the future of the country in the hands of the less than 21,000 people who have voted so far?!
*They had been extended to 11 but Mofaz lodged a protest and it was shortened to 10:30.
Update 8:30 p.m.: Voter turnout among the 14,000 Arab-Israeli Kadima members is far higher than that of the Jewish sector. According to an article in Ynet, as of early Wednesday evening, the non-Jewish sector has demonstrated the highest voting rate among party members. Given that the Iftar feast, marking the end of Ramadan is today, many more are expected to turn out after the feast and, if they continue to turn out in such numbers as have been seen earlier in the day, at least 60% of the Arab Kadima members will have cast their ballots. Hey, at least some sectors are showing responsibility and voting! Well done. It is certainly putting Jewish-Israeli voters to shame.
Update 10:00: Over half of all Kadima voters have now voted.
BUT
Update 10:12: All votes at the Rahat polling station disqualified after crazed man enters the station and hurls cast ballots out the window and into the street! Disturbances happening currently in Nazareth and Holon.
Update 10:40: Polls are now officially closed. Exit polling (notoriously inaccurate) shows Livni with 48% of the votes. This will be the last update until we have the official word, probably around 1 a.m. But since I have a moment, here are a couple of random thoughts not related to the election *grin*. The first is that live-blogging an event is obviously good for one’s traffic as in just the last two hours I’ve had more than 600 people popping by (hence the site being a bit slow to load) –HI!!!. The second is that my electronic turn yourself off kum kum has decided it no longer wants to turn itself off. This is seriously bad for someone with ADHD. I rely on that puppy remembering that boiling is only good when there is still water left in it to boil. Having ADHD also leads one to forget to put the freshly opened cook-one-minute ravioli into the refrigerator while waiting for the kum kum to do its thing and then turn itself off (resulting in several cats having a semi-cooked portion of my dinner). Ok now back to our scheduled waiting for results…..