’Israel’ Vote Puts Netanyahu, Centre-Left on Collision Course

Local Editor

"Israeli" Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu faces a growing threat from center-left rivals who have joined forces to try to oust the rightwing leader in snap elections, experts say.

Knesset on Monday set polling day for March 17, just over two years after Netanyahu's right-leaning coalition took office, and following a spat in which he fired two ministers and called the early vote.

The challenge will come from an alliance between Isaac Herzog's Labor party and the centrist HaTnuah of former minister Tzipi Livni, whom Netanyahu dismissed along with finance minister Yair Lapid.

Such a center-left alliance would win 24 seats in the 120-member Knesset, polls published in Yediot Aharonot and Maariv newspapers said Friday, with the dailies respectively projecting 23 and 20 seats for Netanyahu's Likud.

"Unlike in the previous elections (January 2013), we have a common goal -- to replace Netanyahu," Livni said in a television interview before the Labour-HaTnuah alliance was announced.

The latest poll numbers ignore the strong likelihood of Likud teaming up with other rightwing parties.

The success of Labor-HaTnuah will depend heavily on post-election moves by Moshe Kahlon, an ex-Likud minister who last month formed his own center-right party Kulanu [All of Us], and by Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, head of the far-right Yisrael Beitenu.

"Kahlon and Lieberman will find themselves acting as a pivot after the elections, and both have said they want to end the Netanyahu era," Charbit said.
While Netanyahu is looking to secure a fourth term, some commentators say that whatever the outcome of the vote, he is sure to go.

Netanyahu himself is aware that many would like him out of government.
"There's a clear attempt to kick out the Likud and replace it with the left," he was quoted on public radio as telling his party on Thursday.

"It's the goal of many parties and media officials."

Netanyahu has indicated he might seek alliances with ultra-Orthodox parties, considering them "natural allies", and Yisrael Beitenu as well as the hardline Jewish Home headed by Economy Minister Naftali Bennett.

Source: News Agencies, Edited by website team