Israeli citizens went to the polls this week to vote in an election that long-serving Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu hoped would give him and his Likud party a governing mandate. However, the election resulted in no party securing enough seats in parliament to form a government. Uriel Abulof, visiting professor at Cornell University’s Government Department and senior lecturer of politics at Tel-Aviv University, says that the election is an indication that Netanyahu’s political strategy did not pay off and may have cost him his leadership role.