Israelis are expected to elect a government on Tuesday that plans for the first time to set the final borders of the Jewish state — ending years of expansionism but still holding on to significant parts of the occupied territories.
Opinion polls suggest that the Kadima party founded by the stricken prime minister, Ariel Sharon, will see off all opposition. Although he remains in a coma, public support has largely held up for continuing his strategy of separating from the Palestinians by moving tens of thousands of settlers and using Israel’s vast barrier through the West Bank to mark a frontier.
Large numbers of undecided voters could still affect the balance of power in Parliament, however, and there are signs of a sharp rise in support for anti-Arab parties on the far right.
Surveys give Kadima, under the acting Prime Minister, Ehud Olmert, about 36 seats in the 120-seat Parliament — up to twice as many as its nearest rival and probable coalition partner, the Labour party.
The once dominant Likud, which was led by Sharon until he split the party last year with his removal of Jewish settlers from Gaza, is in third place.
Olmert has campaigned on what he says was Sharon’s vision to use the West Bank barrier as a border. He says he will move about 70 000 settlers living on the Palestinian side of the barrier to larger settlement blocks that Israel will annex. He plans to do this without negotiating with the Palestinians. Amnon Dankner, editor-in-chief of the newspaper Maariv, said Olmert was planning a historic change. He said: ”In effect, he is fighting Israel’s second war of independence — the war for liberation from the burden of the occupation and the settlements, and for our independence as a state with a solid Jewish majority which serves the interests of the great majority of the public, and is not led towards the edge of the abyss by an extremist majority.”
One Kadima Cabinet minister, Meir Sheetrit, attributed his party’s popularity to its lack of ideological baggage — such as Likud’s expansionist claim to territory or Labour’s socialist Zionism — and a policy of separation from the Palestinians that many Israelis now crave. ”That is Kadima’s uniqueness,” he said.
The withdrawal strategy has the backing of Labour and smaller leftwing parties, who are likely to be part of Olmert’s coalition. That consensus has led many people to describe the election campaign as dull. Some party leaders fear that apathy will keep their supporters at home.
Large numbers of floating voters appear to have created wide differences in estimates of how far support for smaller right-wing parties has grown.
A television poll on Sunday gave 15 seats to Yisrael Beiteinu, which advocates redrawing the borders to turn 500 000 Arab Israelis into citizens of a Palestinian state. Such a result would put the party ahead of Likud. But two surveys on Monday showed it losing ground.
The campaign has been marked by some extraordinary moments. On Monday, the Foreign Minister and rising Kadima star, Tzipi Livni, had to flee a Jerusalem market after rightwing traders prevented her from entering as crowds of Likud supporters jeered. A fortnight ago, the Security Minister, Gideon Ezra, was denounced as a traitor at the same market. – Guardian Unlimited Â