One Israel leader Ehud Barak defeated incumbent Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu in the race for prime minister by a landslide margin of 14 to 17 percentage points, according to exit polls run by both state-run television stations, the results of which were announced at 10 p.m.

Channel 1 gave Barak the widest winning margin: 58.5 percent over 41.5%. Channel 2 gave the winning margin at 57% to 43%.

Polling stations opened at 7 a.m. and closed at 10 p.m. An estimated 80 percent of the 4.29 million eligible voters had cast their ballots.

Because the paper ballots from more than 7,000 polling stations around the country are counted by hand, unofficial final results are not expected before 8 a.m. Tuesday.