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Inside Israel

Kadima's poll numbers will drop ? expert

Prime ministerial race likely to be between Netanyahu, Peretz


By Ryan Jones
January 08, 2006

Once public empathy for Prime Minister Ariel Sharon turns to personal compassion, a leading political analyst expects Kadima's poll numbers to plummet, leaving the upcoming race for Israel's next prime minister primarily a contest between Likud leader Binyamin Netanyahu and Labor chief Amir Peretz.

Sharon has been incapacitated since suffering a major stroke and massive cranial hemorrhaging last Wednesday, but a poll conducted at the weekend still showed his newly-formed Kadima Party receiving 39 Knesset mandates if elections were held today.

Political sociologist Yagil Levy of Ben Gurion University attributes that to the fact most Israelis still see Ariel Sharon as their leader, and are worrying for him as such, rather than simply as a man who has reached the end of his life.

But that will change once it becomes clear that, one way or another, Sharon's political career is over.

?Whether Sharon departs from this world or merely leaves politics, the empathy will turn into compassion,? Levy told Ynet. ?In the coming days the attorney general is expected to announce the prime minister is permanently unable to serve as prime minister. That's the point where Kadima will be approached just like other centrist parties. This means it will not receive 40 mandates.?

The most likely benefactor of Sharon's sudden departure from the public arena will be Netanyahu.

Levy believes Kadima will still do well in the March 28 vote, but most saw the party's chances of forming the next government as firmly tied to Sharon's leadership.

In the immediate aftermath of Sharon suffering his second stroke last week, media analysts in the international press saw the possibility that Netanyahu could now become the nation's next prime minister.

Israel?s largely left-wing, Netanyahu-bashing press, however, continues to treat the Likud leader like a leper, deriding his actions and seeking to foment anti-Netanyahu sentiment among the Israeli public.

What kind of coalition ?Bibi? could put together would only become clear as the elections near.

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