Jerusalem ? Benjamin Netanyahu won the endorsement Thursday of an anti-Arab politician who emerged from Israel’s election as a kingmaker, virtually ensuring that the hawkish, U.S.-educated politician will once again become prime minister.

The big question is whether Netanyahu will be able to build the broad coalition he will likely need to stay in power and avoid clashing with the Obama administration and much of the world.

With his top rival, centrist Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, signaling that she would enter the opposition, Netanyahu’s prospects for such a coalition do not look good. He will probably have little choice but to forge a coalition with nationalist and religious parties opposed to peacemaking with the Palestinians and Israel’s other Arab neighbors.