Kuni
03-29-2006, 08:06 PM
Once Powerful Likud Is Big Loser in Israel
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/ap/world/3755119.html
Leaders of the hawkish Likud said the results of Tuesday's election spell disaster for their party, for three decades Israel's ruling faction but now relegated to the ranks of small parties in the new parliament.
The projections showed Likud gaining only 11 seats in the 120-seat parliament, down from 38 in the outgoing house. Most of its voters followed Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to his new party, Kadima, and stayed even after Sharon was felled by a stroke on Jan. 4.
The projections showed Likud receiving even fewer seats than pre-election polls predicted, leaving it as the fifth largest party in the parliament. Likud leaders expected to do much better.
Former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the Likud leader, admitted that his party "suffered a hard blow," but he pledged to help it recover.
Others hinted the abrasive Netanyahu, left at the head of a small, fringe party, might pay the price of the failure.
Correspondent Robert Rosenberg of the Haaretz daily wrote that with his crushing defeat, Netanyahu is forced to turn over leadership of Israel's right to Avigdor Lieberman, whose Yisrael Beitenu party outpolled Likud.
But Netanyahu "blamed Sharon, the press, even the public, for not understanding his message. The one person he did not blame for the Likud's failure was himself," Rosenberg wrote.
Netanyahu, the U.S.-educated former diplomat, was Israel's prime minister from 1996-1999, when he was trounced in an election by Labor's Ehud Barak. Netanyahu has been making a steady comeback since then, serving as Sharon's finance minister. But he quit the government two weeks before the summer pullout from Gaza, saying he could not take responsibility for the unilateral withdrawal.
His departure put him at the head of the rebel Likud camp against Sharon, who bolted Likud in November and formed Kadima after despairing of persuading party rebels to accept further territorial pullbacks in the West Bank.
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/ap/world/3755119.html
Leaders of the hawkish Likud said the results of Tuesday's election spell disaster for their party, for three decades Israel's ruling faction but now relegated to the ranks of small parties in the new parliament.
The projections showed Likud gaining only 11 seats in the 120-seat parliament, down from 38 in the outgoing house. Most of its voters followed Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to his new party, Kadima, and stayed even after Sharon was felled by a stroke on Jan. 4.
The projections showed Likud receiving even fewer seats than pre-election polls predicted, leaving it as the fifth largest party in the parliament. Likud leaders expected to do much better.
Former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the Likud leader, admitted that his party "suffered a hard blow," but he pledged to help it recover.
Others hinted the abrasive Netanyahu, left at the head of a small, fringe party, might pay the price of the failure.
Correspondent Robert Rosenberg of the Haaretz daily wrote that with his crushing defeat, Netanyahu is forced to turn over leadership of Israel's right to Avigdor Lieberman, whose Yisrael Beitenu party outpolled Likud.
But Netanyahu "blamed Sharon, the press, even the public, for not understanding his message. The one person he did not blame for the Likud's failure was himself," Rosenberg wrote.
Netanyahu, the U.S.-educated former diplomat, was Israel's prime minister from 1996-1999, when he was trounced in an election by Labor's Ehud Barak. Netanyahu has been making a steady comeback since then, serving as Sharon's finance minister. But he quit the government two weeks before the summer pullout from Gaza, saying he could not take responsibility for the unilateral withdrawal.
His departure put him at the head of the rebel Likud camp against Sharon, who bolted Likud in November and formed Kadima after despairing of persuading party rebels to accept further territorial pullbacks in the West Bank.