The Central Elections Committee launched an unusual attack on the New Right Party, following the party's announcement this afternoon that "serious fraud" was found in 8 percent of the polling stations.
"The Central Elections Committee insists it was forced, for the first time in its history, to respond to baseless statements expressed in distress, although understandable, that lead to undermining public trust in the election results.
"The committee wishes to make it clear that it rejects the New Right claim by Bennett, as published today, according to which discrepancies and serious election fraud were found in 8 percent of the polling stations," they added.
The Committee said New Right claims are inconsistent. In the beginning, the New Right claimed various lists had deliberately disqualified votes from the special ballot boxes. After list representatives themselves realized there was no substance to their claims, they switched to an alternative argument.
In their alternative argument, New Right claimed last night results should be different (according to unconfirmed reports) and passed a list of 66 polling stations on the grounds that the counting was flawed. New Right claims of 8% of the polling stations are misleading, since the results (most of which, as stated, are to the New Right's disadvantage) are from only five polling stations out of all those checked at their request. In addition, the Elections Committee examined, on its own initiative, hundreds of ballot boxes in a representative sample during the election campaign, and found only minor flaws that were corrected by the committee.
The committee added that the information in question had been identified by the Central Elections Committee even during the campaign integrity operation, and the results of these files were corrected according to the actual results at the ballot box by Central Elections Committee Chairman Judge Chanan Meltzer.
"It should be noted that the Elections Integrity Operation is a campaign carried out by the Central Elections Committee as a matter of routine during days following the elections, during which hundreds of polling stations throughout the country are scrutinized and examined. The flaws that arose from these cases were transferred by Justice Meltzer for police investigation, even before the New Right's announcement, and New Right representatives were duly informed about this," the committee emphasized.
"During the night and morning, teams from the Central Elections Committee conducted thorough checks at all 66 polling stations, and after the examination it became apparent that the New Right had three votes, and after this careful examination it was found that even these claims of the New Right had no real significance. List representatives continue to conduct additional tests and publish inaccurate and misleading data," the Committee says.
At the end of its announcement, the Elections Committee makes it clear it has yet to publish the official results of the elections, to be published in the near future according to the law.