Isaac Herzog, a veteran politician and the scion of a prominent Israeli family, was elected president Tuesday, a largely ceremonial role that is meant to serve as the nation's moral compass and promote unity.
Herzog is set to become Israel's 11th president after securing 87 votes in a secret ballot among the 120 members of the Knesset, or parliament. He will succeed Reuven Rivlin, who leaves office next month at the end of a seven-year term.
"I intend to be the president of everyone," Herzog said after the votes were tallied. "We must defend Israel's international status and its good reputation in the family of nations, fight antisemitism and hatred of Israel, and preserve the pillars of our democracy. "
Herzog, 60, is a former head of Israel's Labor Party and opposition leader who unsuccessfully ran against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the 2015 parliamentary elections.
He comes from a prominent Zionist family. His father, Chaim Herzog, was Israel's ambassador to the United Nations before being elected president. His uncle, Abba Eban, was Israel's first foreign minister and ambassador to the United Nations and United States. His grandfather was the country's first chief rabbi.
Herzog defeated Miriam Peretz, 67, an educator who was seen as a down-to-earth outsider close to the country's dominant conservative and nationalist political camp.
Herzog has served as head of the Jewish Agency, a nonprofit that works closely with the government to promote immigration to Israel, for the past three years since resigning from parliament. He was widely seen as the favorite because of his deep ties to the political establishment. He will hold office for a single seven-year term starting July 9.
The president is tasked with tapping a political party leader to form governing coalitions after parliamentary elections. Israel has held four national elections in the past two years amid a protracted political crisis.
Netanyahu's opponents faced a midnight deadline Wednesday to put together a new coalition government. If they fail, the country could be plunged into another election campaign.
The president also has the power to grant pardons -- creating a potentially sensitive situation as Netanyahu stands trial for a series of corruption charges.
"The title of `first citizen' and the task of guarding the character of the state of Israel, particularly at this point in time, are heavy responsibilities," Rivlin said in a statement congratulating his successor. "I have no doubt that you will bear them superbly."
Peretz immigrated from Morocco as a child and has worked as a teacher, educator and lecturer on Judaism, Zionism and grief. Two of her sons died serving in the Israeli military. In 2018 she was awarded the Israel Prize, the country's top award, for lifetime achievement.
She would have been the first woman and the first settler to hold the office.
She and her family lived in one of Israel's settlements in the Sinai Peninsula until a peace treaty was struck with Egypt in 1979 and the territory was returned. Peretz then moved to the settlement of Givat Zeev, in the occupied West Bank just north of Jerusalem.
Most of the world considers Israel's West Bank settlements illegal under international law and an obstacle to peace with the Palestinians, who seek the territory as part of a future state.
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Associated Press writer Joseph Krauss contributed.
Two Canadians are among those killed in southern Lebanon, Global Affairs Canada confirmed late Tuesday. While GAC has not confirmed their names due to privacy, family members tell Â鶹´«Ã½ the two people killed are Hussein and Daad Tabaja.
An image of the unidentified object shot down over Canada's Yukon territory in February 2023 has been obtained by CTVNews.ca.
MPs debated the first non-confidence motion of the fall House of Commons sitting today, seeing Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre push once again for a snap election. But with votes secured to keep them afloat, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's Liberals were quick to turn the discussion into a referendum on the Conservative alternative.
A city councillor in British Columbia says an online mob of "extremists" and "politically motivated hackers" is responsible for uncovering and publicizing a photo of him wearing a blackface costume to a Halloween party in 2007.
The federal government has 'no intention' of pausing the next planned increase to the carbon price, Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault confirms.
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A Missouri man convicted of breaking into a woman’s home and repeatedly stabbing her was executed Tuesday over the objections of the victim’s family and the prosecutor, who wanted the death sentence commuted to life in prison.
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Four puppies were found near County Road 21 in Essa Township after a passerby spotted one when it ran out of the ditch and onto the road.
After Ontario Premier Doug Ford made controversial comments about solutions to get people out of homeless encampments, advocates and members of the opposition spoke up on Tuesday.
A Missouri man convicted of breaking into a woman’s home and repeatedly stabbing her was executed Tuesday over the objections of the victim’s family and the prosecutor, who wanted the death sentence commuted to life in prison.
Kg rockets, missiles and drones into northern Israel in solidarity with Palestinians in Gaza and its ally Hamas, a fellow Iran-backed militant group. Israel has responded with increasingly heavy airstrikes and the targeted killing of Hezbollah commanders while threatening a wider operation.
Iran’s new president signaled to world leaders Tuesday that he wants to open a 'constructive' chapter in his country’s international relations — but he made clear that everyone else, including the United States, needs to do their part.
A man who authorities say staked out Donald Trump for 12 hours on his golf course in Florida and wrote of his desire to kill him was indicted Tuesday on an attempted assassination charge.
Special counsel Jack Smith this week will be allowed to file hundreds of pages of legal arguments and evidence gathered in the 2020 election subversion and Jan. 6 U.S. Capitol attack criminal case against former president Donald Trump, a federal judge ruled Tuesday.
A federal judge sentenced FTX co-founder Sam Bankman-Fried’s former girlfriend to two years in prison, citing her extensive cooperation with prosecutors that led to the conviction of the former face of the cryptocurrency industry in one of the largest financial frauds in U.S. history.
The federal government has 'no intention' of pausing the next planned increase to the carbon price, Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault confirms.
U.S. President Joe Biden reflected on the motivation behind his decision to step away from politics and sent a message of unity to global leaders gathered at a time of increasing division and geopolitical instability.
MPs debated the first non-confidence motion of the fall House of Commons sitting today, seeing Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre push once again for a snap election. But with votes secured to keep them afloat, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's Liberals were quick to turn the discussion into a referendum on the Conservative alternative.
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A team at the University of Waterloo are developing a process to 3D-print bones, which could dramatically improve the quality of life for cancer and trauma patients.
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The Crown's key witness in the sexual assault trial against former Hedley frontman Jacob Hoggard will take the stand in a northern Ontario courtroom Tuesday afternoon following the judge's instructions to the jury.
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Another woman sued Sean 'Diddy' Combs on Tuesday, alleging that the music mogul and his head of security raped her and recorded it on video at his New York recording studio in 2001.
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Saskatchewan’s Serious Incident Response Team (SIRT) has been deployed following a fatal officer-involved shooting on Fishing Lake First Nation.
The Government of Saskatchewan says a private Christian school, embroiled in abuse allegations, has proved it's met education ministry rules by formally disconnecting from an affiliated church. But, by some indications, connections remain.
An appeal hearing stemming from a court challenge of the Government of Saskatchewan's Parents' Bill of Rights has come to a close.
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An image of the unidentified object shot down over Canada's Yukon territory in February 2023 has been obtained by CTVNews.ca.
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Three construction workers are being praised for their actions that police in Barrie say likely prevented an armed man from fleeing before being taken into custody.
Four puppies were found near County Road 21 in Essa Township after a passerby spotted one when it ran out of the ditch and onto the road.
An Uber driver was handed a 12-month driving ban on Tuesday following a collision that injured a pedestrian and killed a labrador retriever in Barrie.
Ward 3 councillor Renaldo Agostino feels a Ferris wheel is a no-brainer and has asked city administration to look into the possibility of one in a parking lot along the river front in downtown Windsor.
A person from Windsor has died in a collision on Highway 59 in Oxford County.
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A city councillor in British Columbia says an online mob of "extremists" and "politically motivated hackers" is responsible for uncovering and publicizing a photo of him wearing a blackface costume to a Halloween party in 2007.
Less than one month before voters cast their ballots in the provincial election, a new poll of British Columbians shows half of respondents fear for their safety in their own communities.
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The Red Bridge, a historic landmark in Kamloops, B.C., was completely destroyed by fire early Thursday morning.
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Dozens of police officers and support workers have come to Lethbridge for the Social Disorder and Urban Crime Conference.
Police are looking to the public for help after thieves broke into a Lethbridge ice creamery, stealing from the store.
To make higher education an easier step to take for Indigenous students, the University of Lethbridge is dropping some fees for those applicants.
A 25-year-old suspect was charged with impaired driving Sept. 21 after police spotted two people without helmets on an ATV on Sand Bay Road in Goulais River.
A federal offender who was last seen in Sudbury is wanted on a Canada-wide warrant for allegedly breaching his statutory release conditions.
The Crown's key witness in the sexual assault trial against former Hedley frontman Jacob Hoggard will take the stand in a northern Ontario courtroom Tuesday afternoon following the judge's instructions to the jury.
Newfoundland and Labrador sponsored a minor football team in England, now they’re about to play one of the biggest clubs in European soccer.
Newfoundland and Labrador's chief medical officer is monitoring the rise of whooping cough infections across the province as cases of the highly contagious disease continue to grow across Canada.
A 16-year-old biennial event aimed at fostering business in the country's eastern Arctic and northern regions has been cancelled indefinitely as a dispute unfolds between Inuit in Canada and a Labrador group claiming to share their heritage.
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