Diplomats posted to the Israeli Embassy in Wellington, New Zealand kicked off the Knesset election on Thursday.
While voting in Israel begins on November 1, over 4,500 diplomats and their families, as well as Jewish Agency emissaries around the world, started voting in advance at 100 missions abroad with 102 polling stations. Other Israeli citizens abroad are not permitted to vote.
The embassy in New Zealand was the first to open a ballot, followed by Australia, the Philippines and Japan. The last missions will be the consulates in Los Angeles and San Francisco, where voting is set to end at 6 a.m. Israel time.
"For the second time since I came to Wellington in 2021, I am opening the vote in Israeli missions around the world," Ambassador to New Zealand Ran Yaakoby said. "Last year, I expressed hope that this will be the first and last vote during my four-year posting and that the elected government will be stable and successful. This year, as well, I wish that for all of us. Good luck!"
Embassies around the globe vote for Israel's Knesset
The symbol of the Israeli Embassy in Russia, a blue-and-white matryoshka doll with a Star of David on it, stood watch over the ballot in Moscow, as Alexander Ben-Zvi voted.
Israel will not be opening a ballot at its embassy in Kyiv, due to the war. Its staff voted at the Israeli Embassy in Warsaw.
צוות הדיפלומטים של @IsraelinUkraine הצביע בבחירות לכנסת ה-25 pic.twitter.com/ynJF0etEU1
— Michael Brodsky (@michael_brodsk) October 20, 2022
This will be the first election in which voting will be held at the Israeli Embassy in Tegucigalpa, Honduras.
The smallest mission is the embassy in Yaoundé, Cameroon, with three eligible voters and the largest is at the consulate New York, with 750 - 15% of eligible voters abroad - and two ballot stations.
Consul-General to New York Asaf Zamir said "we are ready to allow hundreds of Israelis in New York...to exercise their democratic right and arrive to vote, and I hope that we will only have to do this again in four years."