Every Israeli election is interesting (in the sense of the old Chinese curse), but this one was a stunner. All the polls predicted Benjamin Netanyahu's right-wing coalition coasting to victory, the only real question being how many seats the even more right-wing Jewish Home party would draw away from his Likud-Beiteinu joint list.

Final results aren't in, but Jewish Home, which is very pro-settler, took only 12 seats out of the 120 up for grabs. Add those to Netanyahu's unexpectedly reduced support, and the right will hold an unstable 61-59 majority in the coming Knesset. Last year, the PM could at one point count on more than 90 seats, after he lured 20 members of the centre-right Kadima party to join his National Unity government.

That move allowed Bibi to put off calling an election, but it was Kadima's death knell. Tzipi Livni, ousted as leader by the more hard-line Shaul Mofaz, formed her own seven-seat party. Mofaz tossed his lot in with Bibi, and was rewarded this election with less than 2% of the popular vote -- which means zero seats.

So Kadima has disappeared, with many of its votes going to a brand-new party, called There Is a Future, led by ex-journalist Yair Lapid. It is projected to have 18 or 19 seats, making it the leading opposition party. If, as expected, Bibi aims to form a broad-based coalition government, rather than a religious/settler one, Lapid will have his pick of ministries.

Lapid has already laid out several conditions: he won't join a government with the ultra-orthodox Shas party in it, he wants an end to exemptions from military service -- not only for the orthodox but for Arab Israelis -- and he wants a real effort at restarting peace talks.

Bibi is a tough squeeze, since he's said to be the last person in his own party officially committed to a two-state solution. But the all-settler/all-religious route seems to have hit a brick wall. The next month or so should be very interesting indeed.