Elections for the second Knesset were held in Israel on 30 July, 1951. Voter turnout was 74.3%.

Results

Party	Votes	%	Seats at start of session	Seats at end of session
Mapai ¹	256,456	37.3%	45	47
General Zionists ²	111,394	16.2%	20	22
Mapam ¹	86,095	12.5%	15	7
Hapoel HaMizrachi	46,347	6.8%	8	8
Herut	45,651	6.6%	8	8
Maki ¹	27,334	4.0%	5	7
Progressive Party	22,171	3.2%	4	4
Democratic List for Israeli Arabs	16,370	2.0%	3	3
Agudat Israel	13,799	2.0%	3	3
Sephardim and Oriental Communities ²	12,002	1.8%	2	0
Agudat Israel Workers	11,194	1.6%	2	2
Mizrachi	10,383	1.5%	2	2
Progress and Work	8,067	1.2%	1	1
Yemenite Association	7,965	1.2%	1	1
Agriculture and Development	7,851	1.1%	1	1
Non-qualifiers	4,413	0.6%	-	-
Total valid votes	687,492	100%	120	120
Ahdut HaAvoda - Poale Zion ³	-	-	0	4
Left Faction ¹	-	-	0	0
Faction independent of Ahdut HaAvoda ¹	-	-	0	0

¹ Rostam Bastuni, Avraham Berman and Moshe Sneh left Mapam and set up the Left Faction. Bastuni later returned to Mapam whilst Berman and Sneh joined Maki. Hannah Lamdan and David Livschitz left Mapam and set up the Faction independent of Ahdut HaAvoda before joining Mapai.

² Sephardim and Oriental Communities joined the General Zionists

³ Broke away from Mapam, but not recognised as a separate party by the speaker

Non-qualifiers

The following parties ran in the election, but did not pass the electoral threshold of 1% (6,874 votes):

• For New Immigrants and Freed Soldiers
• Sepharadim-Ashkenazim Unity

The Second Knesset

The second Knesset was highly unstable, with four separate governments and two different Prime Ministers. As with the first Knesset, the speaker was Yosef Sprinzak.

Third government

The second Knesset started with David Ben-Gurion forming the third government of Israel (the first Knesset had two governments) on 8 October 1951. His Mapai party formed a coalition with Mizrachi, Hapoel HaMizrachi, Agudat Israel, Agudat Israel Workers and the three Israeli Arab parties, the Democratic List for Israeli Arabs, Progress and Work and Agriculture and Development. Like the first Knesset, there were 15 ministers. The government resigned on 19 Decembe, 1952 due to a dispute with the religious parties over religious education.

Fourth government

Ben-Gurion formed the fourth government on 24 December 1952, dropping the ultra-orthodox parties (Agudat Israel and Agudat Israel Workers) and replacing them with the General Zionists and the Progressive Party. The new government had 16 ministers. Ben-Gurion resigned on 6 December 1953 as he wished to settle in the Negev kibbutz of Sde Boker.

Fifth government

Moshe Sharett formed the fifth government on 26 January 1954 with the same coalition partners and ministers. Sharett resigned on 29 June 1955, when the General Zionists refused to abstain from voting on a motion of no-confidence brought by Herut and Maki over the government's position on the trial of Malchiel Gruenwald, who had accused Rudolf Kastner of collaborating with the Nazis.

Sixth government

Sharett formed the sixth government on 29 June 1955, eliminating the General Zionists and the Progressive Party from the coalition and reducing the number of ministers to 12. The new government did not last long, as a general election was called for 26 July, 1955.

External links

• Historical overview of the Second Knesset Knesset website
• Knesset Elections Results: Second Knesset Knesset website
• Factional and Government Make-Up of the Second Knesset Knesset website