De Independent bericht:'Israeli elections: Be afraid. Be very afraid
Donald Macintyre reports from Jerusalem on an election campaign that is still too close to call, but one with ominous portents
Sunday, 8 February 2009
Benjamin Netanyahu and Likud look likely to come out on top in Tuesday's election
Israel's Foreign Minister, Tzipi Livni, last night launched a concerted final effort to become her nation's first woman leader since Golda Meir, despite the rightwards shift in public opinion that has threatened to propel Benjamin Netanyahu back into the premiership.
The leader of the centrist Kadima party, who began the closing stages of her campaign with a rally for Druze Arab voters in Galilee last night, issued a direct personal challenge to Mr Netanyahu to agree to the television debate which he has consistently refused.
As polls showing the lead of Mr Netanyahu's right-wing Likud party has narrowed to only two seats ahead of Kadima, Ms Livni's campaign team believes she can overtake her rival by the time Israel goes to the polls on Tuesday.
Mr Netanyahu has emphasised the threats from Hamas and a nuclear Iran in his campaign.
Ms Livni, who strongly supported the recent invasion of Gaza, but has pledged to continue talks on a two-state solution with the moderate West Bank Palestinian leadership, said there was a public demand from potential leaders "to specify with which policies they plan to cope with the threats, and lead [Israel] to a better future of peace and quiet". Meanwhile the outgoing Kadima premier, Ehud Olmert, was making what the Defence Minister, Ehud Barak, said were "supreme efforts" to leave a positive legacy by securing the release of Gilad Shalit, the army corporal seized by Gaza militants in 2006, before polling day.
Turkish TV reported on Friday that Turkish officials were holding talks in Damascus with exiled leaders of Hamas, which has been seeking a large-scale release of Palestinian prisoners in return.
At the same time Mr Barak, Labour's prime ministerial candidate, told Channel 1 TV that Cpl Shalit was known to be "well, alive, breathing and OK".
He added: "You know that I am a fierce critic of the Prime Minister, but in these matters, in these days, he is making a great effort, as am I ... in order to expedite the process." Whether the formidable obstacles to securing the release can be overcome remains to be seen, however.
A Hamas official, Osama al-Muzaini, said talks on the issue had so far made little progress because Israel "remained unwilling to pay the price".
While Mr Barak warned the release of Cpl Shalit would require "painful decisions" – presumably on a prisoner exchange – the electoral effect, if it happened, would probably be to help Labour and Kadima at the expense of Likud and the increasingly popular Yisrael Beiteinu, led by the hard-right Avigdor Lieberman.
According to the polls, the main features of a relatively lacklustre election so far have been the Likud comeback under Mr Netanyahu from its three-decade low of just 12 Knesset seats in the 2006 election, and the seemingly relentless rise of Mr Lieberman, who could yet prove the kingmaker in forming a coalition after Tuesday.
Polls published on Friday – the last allowed before election day – showed Likud with 25 to 27 seats, just ahead of Kadima, with 23 to 25. Mr Lieberman's party with 18 or 19, which, if fulfilled in actual voting, would push the once-dominant Labour Party into fourth place.
Most analysts think the rightward shift has resulted from a combination of two factors. One is Hamas's continued control of Gaza. The other is the stillbirth of the centrist programme under Mr Olmert of withdrawing from settlements and negotiating a peace deal with the moderate Palestinian leadership. This was envisaged at the international Annapolis summit sponsored by President George Bush at the end of 2007.
The change also reflects the widespread popularity among mainstream Israelis – despite the Palestinian death toll of more than 1,200 – of the three-week onslaught on Gaza. This had long been urged by Mr Netanyahu.
Mr Lieberman, a harshly right-wing West Bank settler who wants Israeli Arabs to forfeit their citizenship rights if they fail to pledge loyalty to the Jewish state, was characterised on Friday by a leading Israeli columnist, Nahum Barnea, as "the scarecrow that panic-stricken Israelis want to place in the political cornfield in the hope that the Arabs are crows... and take fright".'
Geen opmerkingen:
Een reactie posten