Posted on 12/19/2005 2:26:00 PM PST by Aussie Dasher
FORMER Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been elected leader of Israel's right Likud party to succeed Ariel Sharon, exit polls for public television and radio said.
The 56-year-old Mr Netanyahu secured 47 per cent of votes while his closest challenger, Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom, won 32 per cent, the poll carried jointly by public television and radio said. The hardline candidate Moshe Feiglin won 15 per cent while Agriculture Minister Israel Katz trailed in fourth place with six per cent.
If confirmed, the result will enable Mr Netanyahu to resume the helm of the party which he led to victory in the 1996 general election before suffering a crushing defeat at the hands of the then Labour party leader Ehud Barak three years later.
The leadership vacancy arose after Mr Netanyahu's arch rival Prime Minister Sharon dramatically resigned from Likud last month and announced the formation of a new centrist party called Kadima.
Go, Bibi, go.
So he didn't even get a majority with Sharon gone...
"Word of the Day for Wednesday July 16, 2003
Pyrrhic victory \PIR-ik\, noun:
A victory achieved at great or excessive cost; a ruinous victory. "
Netanyahu is a capable man. Let's hope he gets off on the right foot this time.
This should be interesting.
I wonder if the Palis are handing out candy, now????
I love Bibi!!!!!!
the BB making a comeback.
Gaza might be getting nervous.
Not a majority, but at least he won. Now we'll see if the party will fall in behind him.
Sharon took office after Barak left in disgrace and Labour's numbers were in the toilet. He managed to fritter away a golden opportunity with strong national support and the Helsinki Peace Process in disrepute. Now he has left the party when they couldn't put up with his strange behavior any longer. If Israel can't pull itself together pretty soon, Iran will have finished building its nuclear weapons, and with Bush being pressed to the wall by treasonous Democrats and media it doesn't look as if anyone else is prepared to deal with a nuclear Iran run by a fanatic.
Bibi don't take no sh_t.
We'll see, he can start with Iran....
Another MIT grad makes good.
Finally some Good News for a change. :-)
And kick every damned arab in Israel out.
So Kadima is "moderate" in Hebrew? LOL
Bibi is a charismatic man, no doubt about it. However, the guy lacks spine and true leadership.
A week before the disengagement from Gaza he basically cowered and decided not to support the disengagement at the very last minute. And that would be fine IF Bibi hadn't initially supported it in the Knesset months earlier. This kind of zigzag mentality will not serve him well in the future.
In order for him to truly be considered the heir of Sharon and the next prime minister of Israel (and that will only happen when Sharon leaves the scene, Bibi has absolutely 0% chance of confronting Sharon and winning) he should grow a spine and provide a true opposition to Sharon's government.
This will be tricky. The Likud party is now seen by many Israelis as a radical right-wing party (Feiglin who is considered a radical got 15% of the votes in the Likud primaries). There is a great challenge for Bibi to turn the party around and help the party become relevant again. Bibi must tread slowly and carefully now, calculate every move he makes, and most importantly - he needs to look further than his own shadow.
Everybody knows Kadima is a one-man party. When Sharon lives, he takes Kadima to the grave with him (figuratively speaking of course). Bibi must use that to his advantage and lay low for a while and wait for the right moment to strike.
Sharon was and is a formidable political leader and statesman. Let's hope Bibi picked up some of the tricks from the old man.
When it comes to the subject of Iran, I don't think it matters that much WHO is in charge of Israel. Iran's actions will dictate the response.
They better be.
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