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      U.K. Conservatives Lose By-Elections, Adding to Pressure on Boris Johnson

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      The double defeat exposed the party’s vulnerabilities and was likely to revive talk of another no-confidence vote against the prime minister.LONDON — Britain’s governing Conservative Party lost two strategically important parliamentary seats on Friday, prompting the resignation of a party chairman and raising fresh doubts about the future of the country’s scandal-scarred leader, Prime Minister Boris Johnson.The double defeat is a stinging rebuke of Mr. Johnson, who survived a no-confidence vote in his party this month, precipitated by a scandal over illicit parties held at Downing Street during the coronavirus pandemic. And it revived talk of another attempt to oust him, though under the party’s current rules Mr. Johnson cannot face another challenge until next June.In elections on Thursday, voters in Tiverton and Honiton, a rural stretch of southwest England that is the party’s heartland, and in the faded northern industrial city of Wakefield evicted the Conservative Party from seats that had come open after lawmakers were brought down by scandals of their own.The Labour Party’s victory in Wakefield was widely expected, and it ran up a comfortable margin over the Conservatives. In the south, which had been viewed as a tossup, the Liberal Democrats scored a stunning upset, overcoming a huge Conservative majority in the last election to win the seat by a solid margin.It was the first time a governing party had lost two seats in a parliamentary by-election since 1991. And as grim as the electoral prospects for the Conservatives look, they could worsen further in the next year, with galloping inflation, interest rate hikes and Britain almost certainly heading for a recession.Prime Minister Boris Johnson of Britain, who is dealing with swelling discontent at home, was in Rwanda on Friday for the opening ceremony of a Commonwealth summit.Pool photo by Dan KitwoodThe political fallout was swift and stark: Oliver Dowden resigned his job as a chairman of the Conservative Party on Friday morning in a letter sent to Mr. Johnson less than two hours after the votes had been counted. The party’s supporters were “distressed and disappointed by recent events, and I share their feelings,” Mr. Dowden wrote, adding that “somebody must take responsibility.”A longtime ally of Mr. Johnson, Mr. Dowden pointedly professed his loyalty to the Conservative Party, rather than to its leader. But on Friday, Mr. Johnson showed no signs of reconsidering his position, even as he acknowledged the defeats and promised to listen to the voters.“Midterm governments, postwar, lose by-elections,” said the prime minister, who is attending a meeting of the leaders of the Commonwealth in Kigali, Rwanda.“We are facing pressures on the costs of living,” Mr. Johnson added. “We are seeing spikes in fuel prices, energy costs, food costs, that is hitting people. We have to recognize that there is more that we have got to do and we certainly will. Challenged later on his own responsibility for the two losses, Mr. Johnson responded: “I genuinely, genuinely, don’t think that the way forward in British politics is to focus on issues of personalities, whether they are mine or others.” Rishi Sunak, the chancellor of the Exchequer, offered his support to the prime minister, echoing his explanation of the defeats and accepting some of the blame. “We all take responsibility for the results and I’m determined to continue working to tackle the cost of living,” he wrote on Twitter.Mr. Sunak had been seen as a potential successor to Mr. Johnson until his popularity plummeted this year, and — although other senior ministers kept noticeably quiet — his statement suggests that a coordinated cabinet move against the prime minister was unlikely. However, one senior Conservative figure, Michael Howard, called for the resignation of a prime minister now seen by many as an electoral liability. “The party, and more importantly the country, would be better off under new leadership,” Mr. Howard, a former Tory leader, told the BBC, adding, “Members of the Cabinet should very carefully consider their positions.”And Geoffrey Clifton-Brown, a senior Conservative lawmaker, said Mr. Johnson could still be removed either by a cabinet rebellion or if the rule protecting him from another no-confidence vote for a year was changed. “There will be a lot of conversations taking place next week,” he told Times Radio, “and we’ll have to see what happens.”The defeats exposed Conservative vulnerabilities on two fronts: the so-called red wall, in the industrial north of England, where Mr. Johnson shattered a traditional Labour stronghold in the 2019 general election, and in the southwest, a traditional Tory stronghold often called the “blue wall.”The political fallout was swift and stark: Oliver Dowden resigned his job as a chairman of the Conservative Party on Friday morning in a letter sent to Mr. Johnson less than two hours after the votes had been counted.Paul Ellis/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesIn Tiverton and Honiton, where the Liberal Democrats won 53 percent of the vote to the Conservatives’ 39 percent, the victorious candidate, Richard Foord, said the result would send “a shock wave through British politics.” The Liberal Democrats’ leader, Ed Davey, called it “the biggest by-election victory our country has ever seen.”The Labour leader, Keir Starmer, said that his party’s victory in Wakefield, where Simon Lightwood won a solid 48 percent of the vote to the Conservative candidate’s 30 percent, was “a clear judgment on a Conservative Party that has run out of energy and ideas.”While the political contours of the two districts are very different, they share a common element: a Conservative lawmaker who resigned in disgrace. In Tiverton and Honiton, Neil Parish quit in April after he admitted watching pornography on his phone while sitting in Parliament. In Wakefield, Imran Ahmad Khan was sentenced to 18 months in prison in May after being convicted of sexually assaulting a teenage boy.Mr. Khan’s legal troubles, which included multiple unsuccessful efforts to have his case heard secretly, meant that Wakefield did not have a functioning representative in Parliament for two years. “The whole unfortunate situation is about a broken political system that ignores the voters and their wishes, and politicians who don’t do the right thing or serve the people who got them into power,” said Gavin Murray, editor of the Wakefield Express newspaper. “This point is amplified and exaggerated by the behavior of Boris and Downing Street.”While there had been little expectation that the Conservatives would hold on to the Wakefield seat, the scale of the victory for Labour suggested that the party could compete successfully against the Conservatives in the next general election.The giant swing in votes in Tiverton and Honiton, a usually safe Conservative district where the party had hoped to hold on, was even more sobering for Mr. Johnson. It suggested that even the most loyal Tory voters had become disenchanted with the serial scandals and nonstop drama surrounding the prime minister.The Labour candidate Simon Lightwood won a solid 48 percent of the vote to the Conservatives’ 30 percent in Wakefield.Andrew Testa for The New York TimesLast year, the Conservatives were stunned by the loss of a parliamentary seat in Chesham and Amersham, a well-heeled district northwest of London. Analysts said that it suggested a backlash against Mr. Johnson’s divisive brand of politics and tax-and-spend policies.The government has promised to “level up” and bolster the economy in northern England, a reward to the red-wall voters. But some analysts see a significant risk of support fracturing among traditional Tories in the south.The Liberal Democrats specialize in fighting on local issues in by-elections. They have a long history of achieving surprise results, and success for them in Tiverton and Honiton consolidated the party’s strong performance in local elections in May, where they also emerged the big winners.In the days leading up to the two elections, Labour and the Liberal Democrats both concentrated their resources in the districts they were better placed to win, leaving the other a freer run. Worryingly for Mr. Johnson, that tactic proved effective.Vince Cable, a former leader of the Liberal Democrats, said that rather than any official cooperation between the two parties, there was a “tacit understanding, relying on the voters to get to a sensible outcome.” Kenneth Baker, a former chairman of the Conservative Party and a member of the House of Lords, said that Mr. Johnson was now too polarizing a figure.“If the Conservative Party continues to be led by Boris,” he said, “there is no chance of the Conservatives winning an overall majority.” More

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      Conservatives Lose 2 U.K. By-Elections, Adding to Pressure on Boris Johnson

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      The double defeat exposed the party’s vulnerabilities and was likely to revive talk of another no-confidence vote against the prime minister.LONDON — Britain’s governing Conservative Party lost two strategically important parliamentary seats on Friday, prompting the resignation of the party’s chairman and raising fresh doubts about the scandal-scarred leadership of Prime Minister Boris Johnson.The double defeat is a stinging rebuke of Mr. Johnson, who survived a no-confidence vote in his party this month, precipitated by a scandal over illicit parties held at Downing Street during the coronavirus pandemic. It will most likely revive talk of another no-confidence vote, though under the party’s current rules, Mr. Johnson should not face another challenge until next June.In elections on Thursday, voters in Tiverton and Honiton, a rural stretch of southwest England that is the party’s heartland, and in the faded northern industrial city of Wakefield evicted the Conservative Party from seats that had come open after lawmakers were brought down by scandals of their own.The Labour Party’s victory in Wakefield was widely expected, and it ran up a comfortable margin over the Conservatives. In the south, which had been viewed as a tossup, the Liberal Democrats scored a stunning upset, overcoming a huge Conservative majority in the last election to win the seat by a solid margin.It was the first time a governing party had lost two seats in a parliamentary by-election since 1991. And as grim as the electoral prospects for the Conservatives look, they could worsen further in the next year, with galloping inflation, interest rate hikes and Britain almost certainly heading for a recession.Prime Minister Boris Johnson of Britain, who is dealing with swelling discontent at home, was in Rwanda on Friday for the opening ceremony of a Commonwealth summit.Pool photo by Dan KitwoodThe political fallout was swift and stark: Oliver Dowden resigned his job as a chairman of the Conservative Party on Friday morning in a letter sent to Mr. Johnson less than two hours after the votes had been counted. The party’s supporters were “distressed and disappointed by recent events, and I share their feelings,” Mr. Dowden wrote, adding that “somebody must take responsibility.”A longtime ally of Mr. Johnson, Mr. Dowden pointedly professed his loyalty to the Conservative Party, rather than to its leader. But on Friday, Mr. Johnson showed no signs of reconsidering his position, even as he acknowledged the defeats and promised to listen to the voters.“Midterm governments, postwar, lose by-elections,” said the prime minister, who is attending a meeting of the leaders of the Commonwealth in Kigali, Rwanda.“We are facing pressures on the costs of living,” Mr. Johnson added. “We are seeing spikes in fuel prices, energy costs, food costs, that is hitting people. We have to recognize that there is more that we have got to do and we certainly will, we will keep going addressing the concerns of people until we get through this patch.”Rishi Sunak, the chancellor of the Exchequer, offered his support to the prime minister, echoing his explanation of the defeats and accepting some of the blame. “We all take responsibility for the results and I’m determined to continue working to tackle the cost of living,” he wrote on Twitter.Mr. Sunak had been seen as a potential successor to Mr. Johnson until his popularity plummeted this year, and — although other senior ministers kept noticeably quiet — his statement suggests that a coordinated cabinet move against the prime minister was unlikely.However, one senior Conservative figure, Michael Howard, called for the resignation of a prime minister now seen by many as an electoral liability. “The party, and more importantly the country, would be better off under new leadership,” Mr. Howard, a former Tory leader, told the BBC, adding, “Members of the Cabinet should very carefully consider their positions.”The defeats exposed Conservative vulnerabilities on two fronts: the so-called red wall, in the industrial north of England, where Mr. Johnson shattered a traditional Labour stronghold in the 2019 general election, and in the southwest, a traditional Tory stronghold often called the “blue wall.”The political fallout was swift and stark: Oliver Dowden resigned his job as a chairman of the Conservative Party on Friday morning in a letter sent to Mr. Johnson less than two hours after the votes had been counted.Paul Ellis/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesIn Tiverton and Honiton, where the Liberal Democrats won 53 percent of the vote to the Conservatives’ 39 percent, the victorious candidate, Richard Foord, said the result would send “a shock wave through British politics.” The Liberal Democrats’ leader, Ed Davey, called it “the biggest by-election victory our country has ever seen.”The Labour leader, Keir Starmer, said that his party’s victory in Wakefield, where Simon Lightwood won a solid 48 percent of the vote to the Conservative candidate’s 30 percent, was “a clear judgment on a Conservative Party that has run out of energy and ideas.”While the political contours of the two districts are very different, they share a common element: a Conservative lawmaker who resigned in disgrace. In Tiverton and Honiton, Neil Parish quit in April after he admitted watching pornography on his phone while sitting in Parliament. In Wakefield, Imran Ahmad Khan was sentenced to 18 months in prison in May after being convicted of sexually assaulting a teenage boy.Mr. Khan’s legal troubles, which included multiple unsuccessful efforts to have his case heard secretly, meant that Wakefield did not have a functioning representative in Parliament for two years.“The whole unfortunate situation is about a broken political system that ignores the voters and their wishes, and politicians who don’t do the right thing or serve the people who got them into power,” said Gavin Murray, editor of the Wakefield Express newspaper. “This point is amplified and exaggerated by the behavior of Boris and Downing Street.”While there had been little expectation that the Conservatives would hold on to the Wakefield seat, the scale of the victory for Labour suggested that the party could compete successfully against the Conservatives in the next general election.The giant swing in votes in Tiverton and Honiton, a usually safe Conservative district where the party had hoped to hold on, was even more sobering for Mr. Johnson. It suggested that even the most loyal Tory voters had become disenchanted with the serial scandals and nonstop drama surrounding the prime minister.The Labour candidate Simon Lightwood won a solid 48 percent of the vote to the Conservatives’ 30 percent in Wakefield.Andrew Testa for The New York TimesLast year, the Conservatives were stunned by the loss of a parliamentary seat in Chesham and Amersham, a well-heeled district northwest of London. Analysts said that it suggested a backlash against Mr. Johnson’s divisive brand of politics and tax-and-spend policies.The government has promised to “level up” and bolster the economy in northern England, a reward to the red-wall voters. But some analysts see a significant risk of support fracturing among traditional Tories in the south.The Liberal Democrats specialize in fighting on local issues in by-elections. They have a long history of achieving surprise results, and success for them in Tiverton and Honiton consolidated the party’s strong performance in local elections in May, where they also emerged the big winners.In the days leading up to the two elections, Labour and the Liberal Democrats both concentrated their resources in the districts they were better placed to win, leaving the other a freer run. Worryingly for Mr. Johnson, that tactic proved effective.Vince Cable, a former leader of the Liberal Democrats, said that rather than any official cooperation between the two parties, there was a “tacit understanding, relying on the voters to get to a sensible outcome.”“Because the economic outlook is so awful, certainly for the next 12 to 18 months, it wouldn’t surprise me if Johnson did something very risky and went for an autumn election,” Mr. Cable said at an election-eve briefing.That is a remarkable reversal of fortune for a party that won an 80-seat majority in Parliament only two-and-half years ago on the strength of Mr. Johnson’s promise to “get Brexit done.”Kenneth Baker, a former chairman of the Conservative Party and a member of the House of Lords, said that Mr. Johnson was now too polarizing a figure.“If the Conservative Party continues to be led by Boris,” he said, “there is no chance of the Conservatives winning an overall majority.” More

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      ¿Por qué Israel tiene tantas elecciones?

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      Los israelíes regresarán a las urnas por quinta vez, en menos de cuatro años.JERUSALÉN — El primer ministro israelí, Naftali Bennett, estará tomando decisiones en los próximos días para disolver el Parlamento y derrocar a su propio gobierno un año después de asumir el cargo, un proceso que desencadenará la celebración de nuevas elecciones dentro de unos meses. El proyecto de ley de disolución ha sido programado para una votación preliminar el miércoles, con una votación final que probablemente se realizará el lunes.La coalición de Bennett había comenzado con una mayoría mínima y recientemente la perdió, lo que hizo que fuese imposible gobernar.Una nueva elección le dará a Benjamin Netanyahu, el ex primer ministro de Israel con más años de servicio y ahora líder de la oposición, la oportunidad de regresar al poder aunque lucha contra unos cargos de corrupción. Sin embargo, su regreso está lejos de estar asegurado.Salvo el escenario improbable de que Netanyahu u otro líder del partido pueda formar una coalición alternativa con al menos 61 escaños en el Parlamento de 120 curules, los israelíes regresarán a las urnas en el otoño por quinta vez en menos de cuatro años.Aquí ofrecemos algunas explicaciones de la actual situación política en el país.¿Qué tipo de gobierno tiene Israel?Israel es una democracia parlamentaria con un sistema electoral de representación proporcional. Ningún partido ha obtenido nunca los votos suficientes para obtener una mayoría absoluta en el Parlamento. Es por eso que los partidos más grandes deben formar coaliciones consiguiendo el apoyo de los movimientos políticos más pequeños que negocian para proteger sus intereses y, a menudo, terminan ejerciendo un poder desproporcionado.Los últimos años han sido particularmente tumultuosos. Entre abril de 2019 y marzo de 2021, Israel celebró cuatro comicios que terminaron sin resultados concluyentes, con una legislatura dividida entre los partidos aliados con Netanyahu, quien fue primer ministro durante 15 años, y los que se oponen a sus intentos de permanecer en el poder.Asientos vacíos en la Knéset, el lunesAbir Sultan/EPA vía Shutterstock¿Por qué colapsó el gobierno actual?Bennett, máximo dirigente de un pequeño partido de derecha, ha liderado una difícil coalición de ocho movimientos formada por opositores políticos de derecha, izquierda y centro con agendas ideológicas enfrentadas, y que incluyó al primer partido árabe independiente que se ha unido a una coalición de gobierno israelí.Apodada por algunos como la “coalición kumbaya”, sus integrantes estaban unidos por el deseo de restaurar un sentido de unidad y estabilidad nacional, y principalmente, derrocar a Netanyahu después de que pasó 12 años consecutivos en el cargo.Pero las tensiones dentro de la coalición por cuestiones políticas y la presión implacable de Netanyahu y sus aliados hicieron que dos miembros de Yamina, el partido de Bennett, abandonaran la coalición. Varios legisladores árabes y de izquierda también se rebelaron en votaciones clave, lo que hizo que el gobierno se paralizara y luego entrara en crisis.Entonces, ¿quién lidera a Israel en este momento?Cuando finalmente se apruebe la disolución del Parlamento, muy probablemente antes de fines de junio, Bennett entregará el poder a Yair Lapid, el ministro de Relaciones Exteriores —un político de centro muy conocido por haber sido una personalidad de la televisión durante muchos años—, quien encabezará un gobierno provisional durante varios meses hasta que se convoque la elección y mientras se realizan las prolongadas negociaciones para una nueva coalición.Según los términos del acuerdo de coalición, se suponía que Lapid, el líder de Yesh Atid, el segundo partido más grande de Israel después del conservador Likud de Netanyahu, remplazaría a Bennett como primer ministro en agosto de 2023.Pero el acuerdo incluía una cláusula de seguridad en caso de que el gobierno no durara tanto. Estipulaba que si el Parlamento se disolvía debido a las acciones de los miembros de la coalición de derecha, como es el caso, Lapid se convertiría automáticamente en primer ministro interino del gobierno provisional.Trabajadores de la Comisión Electoral Central de Israel durante el recuento final de votos en la Knéset, en Jerusalén, el año pasado.Abir Sultan/EPA vía Shutterstock¿Cuándo son las próximas elecciones y quién se postulará?Aún no se ha fijado una fecha para la elección, pero pareciera existir un consenso sobre la fecha, que probablemente será a fines de octubre o principios de noviembre.Netanyahu y su partido Likud lideran las encuestas, seguidos por Lapid y Yesh Atid. Bennett, cuyo partido Yamina ocupaba solo seis escaños en el Parlamento cuando tomó posesión el año pasado, no parece haber obtenido mucho apoyo adicional.Al líder del partido que obtiene la mayor cantidad de votos generalmente se le otorga la primera oportunidad de formar un gobierno. El caso de Bennett fue muy inusual: se desempeñó como primer ministro porque era visto como el más aceptable para el flanco derecho de la diversa coalición.¿La próxima vez será diferente?Es posible que una quinta elección no produzca un resultado más definitivo o un gobierno más estable que las cuatro anteriores, según los analistas.“Hemos estado en esta película cuatro veces y podemos obtener resultados similares una quinta vez”, dijo Gideon Rahat, politólogo de la Universidad Hebrea de Jerusalén.“Por parte de Netanyahu, puede haber 1000 elecciones”, agregó Rahat. “Está preparado para barajar las cartas una y otra vez hasta que gane”.Los aliados de Netanyahu esperan que la decepción con el gobierno de Bennett impulse a los votantes de derecha que habían abandonado al líder político para que vuelvan a apoyarlo.“Mucha gente ha cambiado de opinión”, dijo Tzachi Hanegbi, un legislador experimentado de Likud y exministro, señalando las encuestas que muestran una erosión en el apoyo hacia algunos partidos de la coalición de Bennett.Pero a menos que Netanyahu salga victorioso y forme el próximo gobierno, dijo Ben Caspit, comentarista político y autor de dos biografías de Netanyahu, esta podría ser su última campaña electoral porque algunos de sus aliados políticos parecen menos inclinados a tolerar otro fracaso.Una valla publicitaria del partido Likud el año pasado, en Jerusalén. Muestra a Benjamin Netanyahu, a la derecha, y a sus rivales políticos, Gideon Saar, Naftali Bennett y Yair Lapid con un titular que dice: “Solo Likud formará un gobierno de derecha completo”.Abir Sultan/EPA vía Shutterstock¿Cuáles son los temas más controversiales?Esta última agitación política se produce en medio de una escalada en una batalla clandestina entre Israel e Irán. Y el conflicto con los palestinos se cierne sobre cada elección.Esta vez, es probable que la integración de los partidos árabes de Israel en el gobierno nacional sea el centro de atención. En repetidas oportunidades, Netanyahu intentó deslegitimar al gobierno de Bennett calificándolo como “dependiente de los partidarios del terrorismo”, refiriéndose a los políticos árabes que son ciudadanos de Israel.Los israelíes de centro y de izquierda dicen que un gobierno de Netanyahu dependerá de los extremistas de extrema derecha.Netanyahu ha prometido más acuerdos de paz con países que alguna vez fueron hostiles. Con la ayuda del gobierno de Trump, había establecido relaciones diplomáticas con los Emiratos Árabes Unidos, Bahréin y Marruecos.El aumento del costo de vida y los precios exorbitantes de la vivienda son quizás los temas más preocupantes para muchos votantes.Los críticos de Netanyahu dijeron que si regresa al poder, la democracia misma de Israel estaría en juego porque sus aliados piden restricciones en el sistema judicial y la cancelación de su juicio.“Quiere aplastar la democracia israelí y establecer una dictadura corrupta sin tribunales y con medios que le sirvan”, dijo Or-Ly Barlev, activista social israelí y periodista independiente. “Estamos al borde de un abismo”.Isabel Kershner, corresponsal en Jerusalén, ha estado informando sobre la política israelí y palestina desde 1990. Es autora de “Barrera: la costura del conflicto israelí-palestino”. @IKershner • Facebook More

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      Israel’s Government Collapses, Setting Up 5th Election in 3 Years

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      The governing coalition decided to dissolve Parliament, plunging the country back into paralysis and throwing a political lifeline to Benjamin Netanyahu.JERUSALEM — Israel’s governing coalition will dissolve Parliament before the end of the month, bringing down the government and sending the country to a fifth election in three years, the prime minister said on Monday.The decision plunged Israel back into paralysis and threw a political lifeline to Benjamin Netanyahu, the right-wing prime minister who left office just one year ago upon the formation of the current government. Mr. Netanyahu is currently standing trial on corruption charges but has refused to leave politics, and his Likud party is leading in the polls.Once Parliament formally votes to dissolve itself, it will bring down the curtain on one of the most ambitious political projects in Israeli history: an unwieldy eight-party coalition that united political opponents from the right, left and center, and included the first independent Arab party to join an Israeli governing coalition.But that ideological diversity was also its undoing.Differences between the coalition’s two ideological wings, compounded by unrelenting pressure from Mr. Netanyahu’s right-wing alliance, led two right-wing lawmakers to defect — removing the coalition’s majority in Parliament. When several left-wing and Arab lawmakers also rebelled on key votes, the coalition found it impossible to govern.The final straw was the government’s inability last week to muster enough votes to extend a two-tier legal system in the West Bank, which has differentiated between Israeli settlers and Palestinians since Israel occupied the territory in 1967.Several Arab members of the coalition declined to vote for the system, which must be extended every five years. That prevented the bill’s passage and prompted Prime Minister Naftali Bennett, a former settler leader, to collapse the government and thereby delay a final vote until after another election.“We did everything we possibly could to preserve this government, whose survival we see as a national interest,” Mr. Bennett, 50, said in a televised speech. “To my regret, our efforts did not succeed,” he added.Expected to be held in the fall, the snap election will be Israel’s fifth since April 2019. It comes at an already delicate time for the country, after a rise in Palestinian attacks on Israelis and an escalation in a clandestine war between Israel and Iran. It also complicates diplomacy with Israel’s most important ally, the United States, as the new political crisis arose less than a month before President Joseph R. Biden’s first visit to the Middle East as a head of state.Mr. Biden will be welcomed by a caretaker prime minister, Yair Lapid, the current foreign minister. The terms of the coalition agreement dictated that if the government collapsed because of right-wing defections, Mr. Lapid, a centrist former broadcaster, would take over as interim leader from Mr. Bennett.Mr. Lapid will lead the government for at least several months, through the election campaign and the protracted coalition negotiations likely to follow.Former premier Benjamin Netanyahu speaks to the press at the Knesset on Monday.Oren Ben Hakoon/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesIn a show of unity on Monday night, Mr. Bennett and Mr. Lapid gave consecutive speeches from the same stage, both hailing the successes of an unlikely government that many analysts did not expect to last even for a year.The fractious alliance was formed last June after four inconclusive elections in two years had left Israel without a state budget or a functional government.The coalition’s members agreed to team up to end this paralysis, and because of their shared desire to oust Mr. Netanyahu. Mr. Netanyahu’s refusal to resign despite standing trial on corruption charges had alienated many of his natural allies on the right, leading some of them to ally with their ideological opponents to remove him from office.The coalition was cohesive enough to pass a new budget, Israel’s first in more than three years, and to make key administrative appointments. It steadied Israel’s relationship with the Biden administration and deepened its emerging ties with key Arab states.Its leaders and supporters also hailed it for showing that compromise and civility were still possible in a society deeply divided along political, religious and ethnic lines.“We formed a government which many believed was an impossible one — we formed it in order to stop the terrible tailspin Israel was in the midst of,” Mr. Bennett said in his speech.“Together we were able to pull Israel out from the hole,” he added.Nevertheless, the government was ultimately unable to overcome its contradictions.Its members clashed regularly over the rights of Israel’s Arab minority, the relationship between religion and state, and settlement policy in the occupied West Bank — clashes that ultimately led two key members to defect, and others to vote against government bills.The new election offers Mr. Netanyahu another chance to win enough votes to form his own majority coalition. But his path back to power is far from clear.Polls suggest that his party, Likud, will easily be the largest in the next Parliament, but its allies may not have enough seats to let Mr. Netanyahu assemble a parliamentary majority. Some parties may also only agree to work with Likud if Mr. Netanyahu steps down as party leader.The opening of the summer session of the Knesset last month.Maya Alleruzzo/Associated PressThis dynamic may lead to months of protracted coalition negotiations, returning Israel to the stasis it fell into before Mr. Netanyahu’s departure, when his government lacked the cohesion to enact a national budget or fill important positions in the civil service, and the country held four elections in two years. Through it all, Mr. Netanyahu is expected to remain on trial, a yearslong process that is unaffected by a new election, and which will likely only end if he either accepts a plea deal, is found guilty or innocent, or if prosecutors withdraw their charges. Despite the promises of some coalition members, the outgoing government failed to pass legislation to bar a candidate charged with criminal offenses from becoming prime minister.Critics fear Mr. Netanyahu will use a return to office to pass laws that might obstruct the prosecution, an accusation that he has denied.Understand the Collapse of Israel’s GovernmentCard 1 of 4A fragile coalition. More

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      Fears of Gridlock in France After Macron Is Left With Fragmented Parliament

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      President Emmanuel Macron lost his absolute majority in the lower house. Opposition groups have threatened to block his domestic agenda and called for the resignation of his prime minister.PARIS — President Emmanuel Macron’s ability to govern effectively was in question on Monday after he lost his absolute majority in the lower house of Parliament in France, with opposition groups threatening to block his legislative agenda and openly calling for the resignation of his prime minister.After nationwide voting on Sunday, Mr. Macron’s centrist coalition finished first overall, with 245 seats, but it fell far short of the absolute majority that it enjoyed in the 577-seat National Assembly during his first term, fueling fears of political gridlock.“Ungovernable!” read the front page of Le Parisien, a daily newspaper.Much was still uncertain on Monday after the elections, which produced a complex and fragmented political landscape with three main opposition groups: a left-wing alliance, the far right, and mainstream conservatives. All won enough seats to potentially hamstring Mr. Macron’s legislative agenda, but they are also deeply opposed to each other in various ways, limiting the prospect of a broad, tenable anti-Macron coalition.Still, this much was clear: After five years of relatively smooth sailing in a National Assembly dominated by his party and its allies, Mr. Macron’s second-term agenda is in for a rough ride.“My biggest fear is that the country will be blocked,” Olivia Grégoire, a spokeswoman for Mr. Macron’s government, told France Inter radio on Monday. She said that a coming bill to help French households deal with rising inflation was a top priority and would be a first test of the weakened majority’s ability to build consensus.Mr. Macron must now contend with parliamentary constraints that he had mostly been able to circumvent during his first term. His party will not be able to readily dismiss opposition amendments, for instance, and legislative debates could be much harsher.Jean-Luc Mélenchon, leader of a French hard-left opposition party, speaking to supporters after early results returned on Sunday night.Gonzalo Fuentes/Reuters“It’s like going from a very strong presidential regime to a parliamentary regime,” said Chloé Morin, a political scientist at the Jean-Jaurès Foundation, a progressive think tank. “It moves the center of power to the National Assembly.”But, she added, unlike other European nations, where political parties are used to hammering out coalitions and compromises, that “is neither the culture of politicians nor of the French people.”“We have a culture of verticality,” she said, with extensive presidential powers, and after five years of Mr. Macron’s top-down governing style, none of his opponents appeared inclined to work with him.Instead, Ms. Morin predicted months of gridlock in the National Assembly, which could prompt Mr. Macron to dissolve the body and call new parliamentary elections some time next year.France’s presidents can rule by decree on some issues, and they have a relatively free rein to conduct foreign policy. But major domestic overhauls promised by Mr. Macron during his re-election campaign this year require a bill in Parliament, such as his contentious plans to raise the legal age of retirement to 65, from 62, which Mr. Macron had vowed to get done by the summer of 2023.The fate of such bills is now in jeopardy. Mr. Macron will most likely be forced to seek a coalition or build short-term alliances with opposition forces if he wants to push through legislation. A natural fit would be Les Républicains, the mainstream conservative party, which, on paper at least, could back some of Mr. Macron’s pro-business policies.“It’s not completely blocked, it’s a suspended Parliament,” said Vincent Martigny, a professor of political science at the University of Nice, adding that Mr. Macron “is now completely in the hands of Les Républicains.”But leaders from Les Républicains, some of whom are worried that a long-term coalition with Mr. Macron would incur the anger of their political base, have already ruled out a partnership.Voting in Paris on Sunday. Although Mr. Macron’s coalition finished first overall, it fell far short of the absolute majority that it enjoyed during his first term.Yoan Valat/EPA, via Shutterstock“We campaigned in the opposition, we are in the opposition and we will remain in the opposition,” Christian Jacob, the party’s president, said on Sunday night. “Things are very clear,” he added.The two largest opposition forces in Parliament — a broad coalition of left-wing parties, which secured 131 seats; and Marine Le Pen’s far-right National Rally, which took 89 — have all but promised to challenge Mr. Macron’s government relentlessly.Representatives from both forces wasted no time on Monday as they called for the resignation of Élisabeth Borne, the prime minister appointed by Mr. Macron last month.“The government as formed by Emmanuel Macron cannot continue to govern as if nothing had happened,” Manuel Bompard, a member of the hard-left France Unbowed party, told the French channel BFMTV on Monday. With 72 seats, France Unbowed, under its leader, Jean-Luc Mélenchon, is the biggest force in the left-wing coalition.French prime ministers traditionally resign even after victorious parliamentary elections, only to be immediately reappointed by the president and tasked with tweaking the existing cabinet at the margins.It was unclear what Mr. Macron, who has not yet said anything publicly about the results, would do in the short term. He had vowed that ministers who lost their parliamentary races would have to quit; three fall into that category and will need to be replaced, if Mr. Macron follows through. The president could decide to address voter frustrations by reshuffling his cabinet more extensively.Opposition forces are now expected to control key committees, such as the powerful finance committee that oversees the state budget, and to fill strategic positions in the National Assembly.“They can do everything that Emmanuel Macron doesn’t like, that is, force his hand on some amendments, force him into debates,” Mr. Martigny said.Mr. Macron also lost key allies who would have helped him navigate the National Assembly’s newly treacherous waters and manage its reinvigorated opposition. Richard Ferrand, the president of the lower house, and Christophe Castaner, who was one of Mr. Macron’s top lawmakers there, both lost their seats.Marine Le Pen in Hénin-Beaumont, northern France, on Sunday. She was handily re-elected, and she led her far-right National Rally party to a tally of 89 seats overall.Denis Charlet/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesThe left-wing coalition and the National Rally both have enough lawmakers to bring a vote of no confidence, but they would need to muster an absolute majority in Parliament to bring down the government, which seems unlikely at the moment.“Yes, we are asking for everything that an opposition group is entitled to, the finance committee of course, the vice presidency, of course,” Ms. Le Pen told reporters on Monday. “Will Emmanuel Macron be able to do what he wants? No, and so much the better.”Ms. Le Pen, who was handily re-elected to her own seat in the National Assembly, managed to bring with her a record number of lawmakers, who are now about 10 times as numerous as they were during Mr. Macron’s previous term.That will enable the party to officially form what is known as a parliamentary group, giving the National Rally more speaking time, as well as specific legislative powers such as the ability to create special committees, further anchoring the party in the political mainstream.French political parties receive public funding based on factors that include their election results and their number of seats in Parliament, meaning that the National Rally’s spectacular surge will also bring a welcome financial windfall to a party that has long been indebted.The party is expected to receive almost 10 million euros, about $10.5 million, in public funding every year, compared to around €5 million during the previous term. That could be enough to finally pay off the €9.6 million that remains of a loan the National Rally contracted with a Russian bank in 2014, which has prompted accusations of the party’s having close ties to the Kremlin.Analysts said the surge of the far right was a failure for Mr. Macron, who five years ago began his first term by pledging to unite the French so that there would be “no reason at all to vote for the extremes.”But Ms. Morin and Mr. Martigny also noted that the National Assembly now offered a more accurate photograph of the French political landscape, including with the arrival of more working-class lawmakers.“That’s rather good news,” Mr. Martigny said. “It will force changes in a political culture that was not particularly favorable to parliamentary debates.” More

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      Efforts to Form a New Government in Iraq Descend Into Chaos

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      The powerful Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, who controls the largest bloc in Parliament, has directed dozens of lawmakers loyal to him to resign.Seven months of efforts to form a new government in Iraq were in turmoil on Monday, a day after the powerful Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr directed members of Parliament who are loyal to him to resign from the seats they won in an October election.Mr. Sadr, who has become one of the biggest political forces in Iraq since emerging in 2003, has no formal role but commands the allegiance of the single largest bloc in the 329-seat Parliament. The 73 lawmakers of his movement submitted their resignations on Sunday after the collapse of months of negotiations by Mr. Sadr to form a coalition government with Sunni and Kurdish partners.On Monday, Mr. Sadr’s candidate for prime minister, Jaafar al-Sadr, a cousin of the Shiite cleric and currently the Iraqi ambassador to London, said in a post on Twitter that he was withdrawing his candidacy.The talks on forming a government broke down amid disagreements over who would be president. Under Iraq’s parliamentary system, established after a U.S.-led coalition toppled Saddam Hussein in 2003, the president nominates a prime minister and cabinet ministers who must then be approved by Parliament to take up their posts. The mercurial Muqtada al-Sadr suggested that in abandoning the negotiations, he was sacrificing his bloc’s hard-won gains in the elections last year so that a government could be formed.“This step is considered a sacrifice for the homeland and the people to save them from an unknown fate,” Mr. Sadr said in a statement. “If the survival of the Sadrist bloc is an obstacle to the formation of the government, then all representatives of the bloc are ready to resign from Parliament.”His announcement culminated months of political paralysis that underscored the dysfunction of Iraq’s political system and the fragmentation of the multiple Shiite Muslim political blocs. Those inter-Shiite divisions have supplanted sectarian tensions between Sunni and Shiite groups in past years as a main source of Iraqi instability.Lawmakers from the Sadr political bloc attending the first session of the new Parliament in Baghdad in January. The resignations came after the collapse of months of talks to form a new government.Ali Abdul Hassan/Associated PressMr. Sadr, the son of a revered Shiite cleric assassinated during Saddam Hussein’s regime, formed a militia in 2003 to fight American forces after the U.S. invasion of Iraq turned into an occupation. He also battled Iraqi government forces in Baghdad and in the southern city of Basra before disbanding his militia, called the Mahdi Army.It was not immediately clear whether the resignations were merely a negotiating tactic on Mr. Sadr’s part or a real break with parliamentary politics. But his withdrawal and a related announcement that he was closing most Sadrist offices around the country raised fears that he could replace political negotiations with destabilizing street protests — something he has used before as a lever of pressure.“With the Sadrists apparently out of the actual political process, their history is that when they are not engaged in politics, they’re out in the streets,” said Feisal al-Istrabadi, director of the Center for the Study of the Middle East at Indiana University. “The question is — are they in the formal electoral politics or are they out in the street with their guns?”Mr. Sadr, who presents himself as an Iraqi nationalist, is considered the Shiite political leader least tied to Iran. His withdrawal opens the door for other, Iran-backed parties, to make headway in forming a government.Analysts described the political turmoil kindled by Mr. Sadr’s move as one of the most significant and potentially destabilizing developments since Iraq’s Shiite-led governments were elected after Saddam Hussein was toppled. Although Shiite Muslims are a majority in Iraq, Mr. Hussein, who was executed in 2006, relied predominantly on Sunni Arabs to maintain his power.Mr. Sadr’s main Shiite rivals are tied to Iran-backed militias that were formed in 2014 to fight the Islamic State and are now officially part of Iraqi security forces — though they are only nominally under government control.“This is a major challenge to the post-2003 Shiite order because this is primarily an intra-Shiite political fight,” said Randa Slim, a senior fellow at the Washington-based Middle East Institute. “Both sides are heavily armed now and both sides have shown in the past willingness to do whatever it takes to preserve the system.Another analyst, Zaid al-Ali, author of “The Struggle for Iraq’s Future,” said the divisions were a sign of Iran’s weakening influence on Iraqi politics. Tehran has tried to prevent splits among Iraqi Shiite groups that could dilute Shiite influence in a multisectarian, multiethnic Iraq or that could allow any one Shiite group to become too powerful.“There is a huge amount of division in the Shiite political spectrum, and Iran hasn’t been able to resolve that at all,” he said.Abbas Kadhim, a Washington-based senior fellow at the Atlantic Council, said that even if the move by Mr. Sadr led to fresh elections, that would not fundamentally change the persistent problems in a political system that, since 2003, has relied on dividing up power among the various ethnic and sectarian groupings.The resignations themselves will not prompt elections. Instead, the candidates who received the next-highest number of votes in October would replace the Sadr loyalists in Parliament, according to legal scholars.Constitutional experts said that the parliamentary resignations were effective after being accepted by the speaker, the Sunni politician Mohammed al-Halboosi, and did not require parliamentary approval.A pro-Sadr media organization, Al Jidar, warned Mr. Sadr’s rivals on Monday that they should not consider the resignations something that renders the Sadrist movement ineffectual.“They forget that the gates of hell will be open in front of them and that the Sadrist movement is able to bring down any government they form within only a few hours,” it said in a Telegram post. More

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      Pro-Macron Forces Expected to Prevail but Face Left-Wing Challenge

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      The French president’s party and its centrist allies were neck and neck with a left-wing alliance in France’s first round of parliamentary elections.PARIS — After a first round of voting in French parliamentary elections marked by the lowest turnout on record, President Emmanuel Macron’s party and its allies looked likely on Sunday to retain a majority even as a newly formed coalition of left-wing parties mounted a strong challenge, according to preliminary projections.Just 47.5 percent of the electorate voted, according to the projections based on initial results, a reflection of widespread disillusionment with politics and a feeling that nothing will change whatever the country’s political alignment.The projections, which are generally accurate, showed pro-Macron parties and the left each getting around 25 to 26 percent of the vote. However, the projections also suggested that after the second round of voting Mr. Macron’s centrist alliance would win between 255 and 310 seats in the 577-member National Assembly.The left-wing alliance known by the acronym NUPES, for Nouvelle Union Populaire Écologique et Sociale, would have 150 to 210 seats.The second round of the elections — for candidates who did not win outright this time — will be held next Sunday.Unlike many of its European neighbors, France awards seats to candidates who get the most ballots in each district, rather than by proportion of the total vote across the country, meaning that percentage vote shares are an imperfect measure of what the National Assembly will ultimately look like.President Emmanuel Macron of France after casting his ballot in parliamentary elections on Sunday in the seaside town of Le Touquet, in northern France. Ludovic Marin/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesIf Mr. Macron’s party and its allies muster an absolute majority of seats — 289 — he will have relatively free rein to enact his legislative agenda. That seemed plausible but by no means certain after the first round.There has been no honeymoon for Mr. Macron, who was decisively re-elected in April. In the end, he won more because enough voters were determined to keep his extreme-right opponent, Marine Le Pen, out than because there was any wave of enthusiasm for him. Energy and food bills have been rising, and the president has at times seemed curiously disengaged from France’s citizens and their concerns.The result in Sunday’s elections represented a remarkable achievement for Jean-Luc Mélenchon, the fiery leftist leader who has benefited from the broad anxiety in French society over inflation. He managed to forge a movement uniting his own France Unbowed Party with the Socialists, Greens and Communists, after the left proved hopelessly divided during the presidential election and was largely sidelined.Emmanuel Macron’s Second Term as President of FranceWith the reelection of Emmanuel Macron, French voters favored his promise of stability  over the temptation of an extremist lurch.Cabinet: President Macron’s new government combines continuity with change, as newcomers at the foreign and education ministries join first-term veterans.New Prime Minister: Élisabeth Borne, the minister of labor who previously was in charge of the environment, will be the second woman to hold the post in France.Overcoming Tragedy: Ms. Borne’s father, a World War II resistance member and a Holocaust survivor, killed himself when she was 11, an experience she has rarely discussed in public.Rape Allegations: Two women have accused Damien Abad, the newly appointed minister for solidarity and for disabled people, of raping them. Mr. Abad has denied the allegations.However, Mr. Mélenchon, who had wanted to turn the vote into a plebiscite that would force Mr. Macron to make him prime minister, appeared to have failed in that aim.Among other measures, Mr. Mélenchon wants to reduce the retirement age to 60 from 62, raise the minimum wage, phase out the nuclear plants that provide most of France’s energy and bend European Union rules to allow higher debt and deficits.A poster for the NUPES coalition, led by Jean-Luc Mélenchon, in Paris, on Sunday. Mr. Mélenchon is pictured on the left in the poster. Christophe Petit Tesson/EPA, via ShutterstockMr. Mélenchon, in a televised address on Sunday, said that the left-wing alliance had “magnificently” succeeded in its first test, “campaigning together, shoulder to shoulder, and convincing.” He insisted, against the evidence, that Mr. Macron’s party had lost its dominance.“For the first time in the Fifth Republic, a newly elected president has been unable to muster a majority in the following legislative election,” he said, an apparent reference to the equal vote shares on Sunday.The final composition of the National Assembly will become clear only after the second round of voting. Runoffs are usually held when no candidate gets more than half of the vote in the first round. They are contested between the top two vote-getters in a district, although under certain conditions they can feature three or even four candidates. Whoever wins the most votes in the runoff wins the race.If Mr. Macron’s party and its allies lose their absolute majority next Sunday, he will be forced to reach out to lawmakers from opposing parties, most probably the center-right Republicans, for support on certain bills. The projection showed the Republicans and their allies claiming 40 to 60 seats.The president, whose party and its allies currently hold 345 seats, named a government only last month, led by Prime Minister Élisabeth Borne. Her impact up to now seems to have been minimal.Prime Minister Élisabeth Borne of France voting on Sunday in Calvados, in the country’s north.Sameer Al-Doumy/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesSeveral of Mr. Macron’s cabinet members are running in the elections, including Ms. Borne. On Sunday none appeared to have been knocked out of the election. Their races were being closely watched, as a loss by one or several of them next week would be a rebuke of Mr. Macron, who has warned that those who are not elected will be obliged to leave his cabinet.Ms. Borne said in a televised address on Sunday that Mr. Macron’s party and its allies were the “only political force capable of obtaining a majority.”“Faced with the situation in the world, and war on Europe’s doorstep, we cannot take the risk of instability and of approximations,” she said. “Faced with extremes, we will yield nothing, not on one side nor the other.”If the turnout — the lowest on record for the first round of legislative elections — was linked to broad dissatisfaction with politics, it might also have reflected Mr. Macron’s highly personalized top-down style during his first term, which has often made France’s Parliament seem marginal or even irrelevant. He has now promised to govern in a more consultative way — but then he promised that in 2017, only to embrace the enormous powers of the presidency with apparent relish.Mr. Macron is the first incumbent to be re-elected since Jacques Chirac in 2002. After stumbling during the presidential campaign, he recovered to defeat Ms. Le Pen by a margin of 17 percentage points.Since then, Ms. Le Pen’s anti-immigrant National Rally party has had trouble connecting with voters and, after the first round of voting, appeared likely to end up with no more than a few dozen seats.On Sunday, Ms. Le Pen, who was poised to keep her seat in Parliament, called on her supporters to abstain from voting in the event of a runoff between a candidate from the left-wing alliance and one from Mr. Macron’s coalition, to prevent Mr. Macron from gaining an absolute majority.“It’s important to not let Mr. Macron get an absolute majority,” she said. “If you let him, we risk entering a tunnel over the next five years, a lightless tunnel.”Éric Zemmour, a far-right pundit who briefly shook up the presidential election with anti-immigrant stances even more extreme than Ms. Le Pen’s, had entered the parliamentary race in the southern Var area of France, but on Sunday he was knocked out.Marine Le Pen after voting in Henin Beaumont, in northern France.Stephanie Lecocq/EPA, via ShutterstockForeign policy is largely determined by the president, but Mr. Macron needs Parliament for his domestic agenda. This includes his contentious vow to raise the legal age of retirement progressively to 65 from 62. He would like to see a bill enacted within 12 months to that effect.More pressing is a government bill to prop up French purchasing power, which has taken a hit from rising inflation. The government wants Parliament to vote over the summer on the bill, which includes subsidies for poorer households to buy essential food products.The National Assembly is the more powerful house of Parliament, with greater leeway to legislate and challenge the executive than the Senate. It usually has the final word if the two houses disagree on a bill, and it is the only house that can topple a French cabinet with a no-confidence vote.The party that Mr. Macron founded, La République en Marche, swept to victory in 2017 with a wave of political newcomers as candidates. For these elections, La République en Marche is the largest force in a coalition called Ensemble, which includes some of Mr. Macron’s longtime centrist allies and some newer ones.The left-wing alliance ran a vigorous campaign that saturated airwaves and that focused heavily on Mr. Mélenchon. With typical bravado, and equally typical hyperbole, he promised that French voters could “elect” him prime minister by sweeping in a left-wing majority in Parliament for the first time in a decade. The prime minister is in fact appointed by the president.But Mr. Macron is a formidable opponent, as several elections have now shown. He has proved masterful in occupying the entire middle ground in French politics, eclipsing both the center-left Socialists and the center-right Republicans.Whatever the temptation of the extremes for French voters angered over the economic situation and immigration, the center retains a strong appeal, and the country has resisted the kind of blow-up-the-system political lurch evident in America’s election of Donald J. Trump and Britain’s choice of Brexit.Constant Méheut More

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      What to Know About France’s Parliamentary Elections

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      President Emmanuel Macron is looking to secure a strong majority to help him pass bills during his second term, but a reinvigorated alliance of left-wing parties hopes to thwart him.PARIS — Weeks after re-electing President Emmanuel Macron, voters in France return to the polls on Sunday to choose their parliamentary representatives, elections that will determine whether Mr. Macron’s bills sail or stumble through the legislature during his second term.All 577 seats are up for grabs in the National Assembly, France’s lower and more powerful house of Parliament, which Mr. Macron’s party and its allies currently control. Most polls predict that will remain the case — to a degree.France’s modern presidential and parliamentary elections are held only months apart, on the same five-year cycle. Over the past two decades, voters have always given their newly elected president strong parliamentary backing, and polls and experts suggest that would be a likely outcome for Mr. Macron this time, too.His biggest challenge comes from a reinvigorated alliance of France’s left-wing forces, which have taken the rare step of setting aside personal squabbles and ideological differences to mount a united front. Jean-Luc Mélenchon, the leader of the far-left France Unbowed party, the dominating force in that alliance, is hoping it can eke out a narrow victory and compel Mr. Macron to appoint him prime minister.But so far, according to recent surveys, voters have been more concerned by surging inflation than by the campaign, and pollsters say they expect record-low turnout.Here is a primer on the elections, which will be held in two rounds, on Sunday and on June 19.President Emmanuel Macron’s party and its allies currently control the National Assembly, and most polls predict that will remain the case — to a degree.Ludovic Marin/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesWhat is at stake?Presidents hold France’s most powerful political office, with broad abilities to govern by decree. But they need Parliament, and especially the National Assembly, to accomplish most of their bigger domestic policy goals, push through spending bills or change the Constitution.Emmanuel Macron’s Second Term as President of FranceWith the reelection of Emmanuel Macron, French voters favored his promise of stability  over the temptation of an extremist lurch.Cabinet: President Macron’s new government combines continuity with change, as newcomers at the foreign and education ministries join first-term veterans.New Prime Minister: Élisabeth Borne, the minister of labor who previously was in charge of the environment, will be the second woman to hold the post in France.Overcoming Tragedy: Ms. Borne’s father, a World War II resistance member and a Holocaust survivor, killed himself when she was 11, an experience she has rarely discussed in public.Rape Allegations: Two women have accused Damien Abad, the newly appointed minister for solidarity and for disabled people, of raping them. Mr. Abad has denied the allegations.Some of Mr. Macron’s prominent campaign promises, like his vow to raise the legal age of retirement, require legislation. His new government also wants to tackle the effects of inflation, requiring lawmakers to vote on measures like food subsidies.The main players in the elections are:Ensemble, a centrist coalition that includes La République en Marche, the party that Mr. Macron founded and that swept to victory in 2017 with a wave of political newcomers as candidates.La Nouvelle Union Populaire Écologique et Sociale, more commonly known by its acronym NUPES, a left-wing alliance brought together by Mr. Mélenchon’s France Unbowed party that includes the Socialist, Green and Communist parties.A group of traditional right-wing parties, led by Les Républicains, the mainstream conservatives.The far-right National Rally party of Marine Le Pen, who was defeated by Mr. Macron in the presidential runoff in April.The latest polls suggest that Ensemble and NUPES are neck-and-neck, with about 25 to 28 percent each. The National Rally is predicted to receive around 20 to 21 percent of the vote, with Les Républicains roughly 10 to 11 percent. Smaller groups, including the party of Éric Zemmour, a far-right pundit who ran for president, are polling in the single digits.If Mr. Macron’s party alone musters an absolute majority of seats — 289 — he will have relatively free rein to enact his legislative agenda. A repeat of the current situation, in which his party and its allies hold an absolute majority, would make him dependent on the coalition to pass some legislation. But if his party and its allies lose too much ground, they could be forced to reach out to lawmakers from opposing parties on certain bills. And if NUPES is able to secure control of Parliament, it would force Mr. Macron to appoint a new prime minister and a new cabinet, potentially blocking much of his agenda.A polling station in Neuilly-sur-Seine, France, in April during the second round of the country’s presidential election.Andrea Mantovani for The New York TimesHow do the elections work?France’s 577 electoral districts cover the mainland, overseas departments and territories, as well as French citizens living abroad. Each district has one seat. More than 6,200 candidates are running for office nationwide.Any number of candidates can compete in the first round in each district, but there are specific thresholds to reach the second round. While in most cases the runoff will feature the top two vote-getters, it can sometimes feature three or even four of them. Whoever wins the most votes in that runoff wins the race. (Under some conditions, a candidate who gets more than 50 percent of the vote in the first round wins outright.)The two-round system usually produces stable majorities that French governments can rely on, but it comes at a cost. The makeup of the National Assembly does not always accurately reflect the country’s broader political landscape and usually skews in favor of bigger parties. Smaller ones complain that their voters do not get the representation they deserve, fueling disaffection with the political system.French presidential candidates, including Mr. Macron, have repeatedly floated the idea of fixing that discrepancy by introducing a dose of proportional representation for parliamentary elections. But a bill on that issue never came to fruition during Mr. Macron’s first term, and it is unclear whether he will pursue the idea during his second.Jean-Luc Mélenchon speaking on Friday at a gathering in Marseille, in southern France, to support candidates from NUPES, a left-wing coalition.Daniel Cole/Associated PressWhat does the National Assembly do?The National Assembly and the Senate — currently controlled by the right — are France’s two houses of Parliament. Both are based in Paris and play important roles in drafting bills and voting laws. But only the National Assembly is elected directly by the people, and it has more leeway to legislate and challenge the executive.The National Assembly usually has the final word if the two houses disagree on a bill, and it is the only house that can topple a French cabinet with a no-confidence vote. It has some prerogatives on key legislation like spending or social security bills.Lawmakers can question cabinet members; they can also establish investigative commissions and hold hearings, although their powers and the scope of their investigations are more limited than congressional inquiries in the United States.Unless the president dissolves the National Assembly and calls for new elections — a move that is rarely attempted — lawmakers are in office for five years.Inside the National Assembly in Paris. The body’s lawmakers are elected to serve for five years.Stephane De Sakutin/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesWhat comes next?The last voting stations close at 8 p.m. on Election Day, which is when the French news media will work with pollsters to publish the first projected results based on preliminary counts. Races will be called district by district as the evening progresses.Those first results will give a sense of each party’s standing and of the direction each race might take, but the National Assembly’s final composition will become clear only after the runoffs.Several ministers are running in the elections, including Élisabeth Borne, the prime minister. Their races will be closely watched, as a loss by one or several of them would be seen as a rebuke of Mr. Macron, who has warned that those who are not elected will leave his cabinet. More