JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Deadlocked talks with potential coalition partners have forced Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to seek more time to build a new government and avert a possible snap election, officials said on Friday.

They said Netanyahu would meet President Shimon Peres on Saturday to ask for a two-week extension after his right-wing party, the narrow victor in Israel's January 22 ballot, exhausted the standard four weeks allotted to build a coalition.

Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addresses a meeting of the Jewish Agency's Board of Governors in Jerusalem February 18, 2013. REUTERS/Baz Ratner

Peres is expected to accept Netanyahu's request.

However, should the rightist premier fail to win enough allies for a parliamentary majority by March 16, the president could hand the task to a rival party leader. If no government emerged then, Israelis may have to return to the polls.

U.S. President Barack Obama is due to visit Israel at the end of March.

Netanyahu's trouble building a new government raises the question of whether he may call off that visit. But when asked about Israeli reports he might cancel, an official in Washington, speaking on condition of anonymity, said there was no talk at this point about the possibility of scrubbing the trip.

White House spokeswoman Bernadette Meehan said: "President Obama looks forward to travelling to Jerusalem, Ramallah and Amman later this month."

Netanyahu's Likud-Beitenu ticket won 31 of the Knesset's 120 seats in the January vote - an eroded lead that required he cast a wide net for partners while juggling their disparate demands.

He has faced strong demands from the parties that placed second and fourth, Yesh Atid (There is a Future) and Bayit Yehudi (Jewish Home), to cut back mass exemptions from military conscription and welfare stipends to ultra-Orthodox Jews.

David Shimron, Likud Beitenu's negotiator, said before meeting Bayit Yehudi on Friday that Yesh Atid was "ruling out" sitting in government with the ultra-Orthodox. Yesh Atid has not disputed that characterisation.

"We need to clarify this and other matters with Bayit Yehudi," Shimron told reporters. "In the end of the day, we have to build a government, and we do not accept the invalidation of a sector that is part of the Israeli people."

Netanyahu's outgoing coalition includes two ultra-Orthodox parties which have generally backed him on other policies such the settlement of occupied West Bank land in defiance of world powers, who support the Palestinians' drive for statehood there.

Bayit Yehudi is even less accommodating of the Palestinians than Netanyahu, who says he wants to revive stalled peace talks. By contrast, Yesh Atid says Israeli diplomacy is too listless.

(Additional reporting by Matt Spetalnick in Washington; Writing by Dan Williams; Editing by Crispian Balmer and Michael Roddy)

Related Stories:
Three Gazans wounded by Israeli gunfire - Palestinian medics

• Ingress net profit down 9.1%
• Unimech to list its Indonesian unit
• Maybank sells 9% stake of PT Bank International Indonesia
• KLCI closes 0.59% lower amidst Fed's end of stimulus, China slowdown
• More Singaporean companies making prompt payments
• Luster waiting for concrete offer before deciding
• Spot gold falls to lowest since January 2011
• Ivory Group to start phase 3 to 5 of Penang Times Square by year-end
• Japanese corporates might be eyeing Malaysia as operational hub
• MHTC eyes RM630mil revenue for medical tourism
• Lazada secures RM320mil fund
• MBM Resources targets RM4b revenue by 2015
• MRCB gets go-ahead for Nusa Gapurna merger (Update)
• Asian markets in the red, KLCI down 10 points at midday (Update)
• Malaysia PC sales hit 898,000 in Q1, 2013, Lenovo top vendor

• China astronaut teaches lesson from space
• Singapore demands urgent Indonesia action on smog
• Assange says WikiLeaks assisting Snowden asylum bid
• Kim Dotcom slams Megaupload 'data massacre'
• Study: Jordan teens still 'honour killings' justified

• Murray poised to end Britain's 77 years of pain
• Steady as Jie goes
• Ferrer loses title after opening round loss
• Park preps for third major title bid at LPGA event
• Gavin Green confident he can take on title-holders this weekend
• Zhang switches focus on developing golf in China
• Thaworn hopes to find his ‘A’ game in Selangor Masters
• Paul Revington is glad to be back to train the Malaysian team
• Heavy task on Faizal’s shoulders
• Singapore Open: Chong Wei Feng fights to survive
• Rachel owes her rich vein of form to change in technique
• Future looks gloomy for men’s squash when Beng Hee calls it a day
• Khairy: RM8mil to be forked out for Sukma due to lack of sponsorship
• A chance for local cyclists to shine
• Rahul survives weekend of harsh hurdles in Norfolk

• Please wait.

• MCMC offers free money to small businesses, few takers
• It’s Honda Accord now for ministers
• Striptease queen married five times in search of true love, says author
• China’s Comtec to build one of world’s largest solar wafer making plants in Kuching for RM1.2bil
• Singapore's air turns "hazardous" as Indonesian fires rage
• Nightmare over topless pictures
• Haze: All Batu Pahat schools to close for two days
• Use of psychometrics assessment for employees can be controversial
• ‘Body buried 13 storeys deep’
• China lifts freeze on Malaysian bird's nest imports