Israel on Tuesday morning started a day-long general election to choose its next parliament and premiership.

Some 5.3 million Israelis, out of a total of about 7.2 million, are eligible for the vote, which began at 7 a.m. local time (0500 GMT) and lasts till 10 p.m. (2000 GMT) at over 9,200 polling stations across the Jewish state.

Voters were seen heading to and waiting at polling stations in strong wind and cold rain, as supporters of different parties put up their banners outside in last-ditch efforts to woo undecided voters.

Thirty-three groups are competing for a share of the 120 parliamentary seats, and they must pass the minimum threshold of two percent of votes cast in order to be represented. In the last general election in 2006, 31 parties registered to run but only 12 entered the legislature.

Recent polls indicted a close match between the two front- running parties, the center-right Likud and the centrist Kadima, with the former enjoying a small edge. Trailing behind them are the ultra-nationalist Israel Beiteinu and the center-left Labor.

Voters turnout is expected to be low, although leaders of major political parties have recently been urging their supporters to vote. Besides, the stormy weather forecast to sweep the country on the election day, a national holiday, would likely sweep away the willingness of apathetic and undecided voters to take extra efforts to go to polling stations.

Israeli President Shimon Peres on Monday also called on all the Israelis to vote in the election, which is conducted with a budget of about 207 million shekels (about 52 million U.S. dollars). In the 2006 election, the turnout rate is 63.2 percent, lower than in all previous ones.

Some 16,000 police and Border Guard officers, as well as about 2,500 volunteers and 4,500 security guards, have been mobilized to beef up security measures at polling stations and crowded sites, and the medical rescue service has also been put on high alert. The Israeli army has also imposed a full-day general closure of the West Bank.

After the vote ends, working staff at each polling station will count the ballots and bring the results to regional election committees, which will then vet the counts and feed the figures into the database of the Central Election Committee.

Results of exit polls will be released by local media shortly after the election is closed, and final results are expected on Wednesday morning. Official results will be published on Feb. 18.

Israel's overseas diplomatic missions have already been voting since the beginning of this month, and soldiers and other special voters at home also cast their ballots in advance. Their votes will be counted also after the Tuesday polling finishes.

Following the election, the president will task a lawmaker, usually the leader of the party that wins the most votes, with forming a new government. The prime minister-designate will have a maximum of 42 days to finish the cabinet-making mission.

With neither Likud nor Kadima expected to win more than 30 seats, it is all but certain that no single party would secure a majority in the new parliament. Thus any cabinet has to rule in the form of a coalition, and inter-partisan bargaining seems inevitable.

In Israel's fragmentary political realm, no party has won a landslide victory in any general election in the country's 61-year history.

Till the new cabinet is sworn in, caretaker Prime Minister Ehud Olmert will remain in office. His reluctant resignation in September amid a corruption scandal and the failure to establish a new cabinet by acting Prime Minister Tzipi Livni, the new Kadima chief and foreign minister, brought forth the general election a year ahead of its original schedule.

The vote came three weeks after Israel wrapped up its massive military operation in the Gaza Strip, aimed to end the continuous rocket fire against southern Israel. Although Israel and the Gaza- ruling Hamas movement decided to hold a ceasefire from Jan. 18, rocket attacks from Gaza and Israeli bombardment continued at times.

Palestinian Foreign Minister Riad Malki on Monday hinted that Gazan militants might continue firing at Israel on Tuesday as "a way to interfere" in the Israeli election. He said that the Palestinian National Authority is "very much worried" that such attacks might "really push Israeli public opinion and the voters to vote for an anti-peace government."

Although it is too early to tell which party will win the election, what seems certain is that right-wing parties would get at least a slight majority of seats. That would possibly make any new Israeli government lean rightward, casting a heavier shadow over the already sluggish Palestinian-Israeli peace process.

(Xinhua News Agency February 10, 2009)