14 - 20 December 2000
Issue No.512
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Al-Ahram Weekly On-line 14 - 20 December 2000 Issue No.512 |
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 | Current issue | Previous issue | Site map | ||
Barak in the corner
Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak's call for early elections opens up the possibility of sweeping changes within Israel, both with regard to its stance towards the peace process and to the domestic political configuration. That this should be the case is testimony to the power of the Palestinian Intifada to effect the direction of Israeli attitudes and politics.
Barak's sudden resignation, moreover, has stirred considerable controversy inside Israel. Barak claims that because of the urgent situation precipitated by the Palestinian Intifada Israel cannot afford the usual run up time to elections -- six to seven months instead of the 60 to 90 days currently being faced -- a claim intended to present the current prime minister as someone with Israel's higher interests in mind, seeking a new mandate from the Israeli people in order to be able proceed more resolutely on the path to peace in the Middle East.
Others, though, suggest there are far more practical considerations behind the calling of snap elections. Chief among them is the attempt to keep former Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu out of the race. According to Israeli law, in the event of a prime minister resigning candidates for the post must be Knesset members. Conveniently for Barak, Netanyahu resigned his Knesset seat when he stood down as Likud leader following his defeat in the last elections.
Were he to stand in the forthcoming elections, opinion polls indicate that he would beat Barak hands down. Without Netanyahu in the equation, however, the polls show Barak and Ariel Sharon neck to neck, which has given rise to suspicions that Barak's resignation was part of a secret bargain between the Labour and Likud leaders to keep Netanyahu out of the race and then form a national unity government, regardless of who wins the elections.
Of course, Barak and Sharon vehemently deny such allegations and have voiced their support for a legislative amendment to permit any Israeli citizen to tender his candidacy. The proposed amendment, for its part, has already triggered heated debate, and it is expected to bring the pro-Sharon and pro-Netanyahu factions inside the Likud to loggerheads. This, needless to say, could only be in Barak's interests.
Additionally, early elections are likely to work in Barak's favour by heading off attempts to return to the previous system whereby the leader of the largest party in the Knesset automatically forms a government. Opinion polls indicate that were elections to be held today Likud would score an overwhelming victory, winning some 45 Knesset seats as opposed to the 19 it currently controls, while Barak's resignation will also test the power of the smaller parties that initially supported the decision to dissolve parliament and hold early elections.
Undoubtedly Barak believes that his resignation and call for early elections will blackmail the Palestinians and Arabs into easing up on the Intifada and showing greater flexibility on final status issues. After all, he imagines, the Palestinians would certainly find the alternatives -- Sharon or Netanyahu or an ultra-right coalition -- less palatable than his own candidacy. He should not, however, put too much stock in this line of thinking. Given his record of reneging on each and every agreement signed with the Palestinians and the savage brutality with which his government has suppressed the Aqsa Intifada, the Palestinians would be hard put to find any significant difference between Labour and Likud.
This dismal record, of course, has not kept Barak from propounding on the achievements of his 18 months in power: the Israeli withdrawal from southern Lebanon, the highest economic growth rate in Israel's history, thousands more job opportunities for Israel's unemployed, a huge boost in government allocations for education and the broaching of final status issues with the Palestinians. But whatever Israeli voters make of these claims, what is certain is that Barak's sudden resignation was coldly calculated -- all the more so given it allows him a period of at least two months during which, as head of the interim government, he will have virtually a free hand since there is no risk of a vote of no confidence.
Barak would not have embarked on his recent action without believing he might recover his popularity in the polls, currently at an all time low. To this end we can expect him to pursue one of two alternatives. The first is to take some positive steps forward on the peace process, perhaps going so far as to reach an agreement with the Palestinians that would bring a halt to the Intifada. This course of action would hold great promise for rescuing his government given that 55 per cent of Israelis still support a peace agreement with the Palestinians that entails withdrawing from the occupied territories, including East Jerusalem. However, it is doubtful whether he will pursue this path. Against his promises, issued after his resignation, to implement the resolutions of the Sharm Al-Sheikh Summit and to revive the peace process we have seen only sustained assaults against the Palestinians and repeated affirmations that he is not prepared to make the necessary concessions for peace
His second alternative is to make a secret power sharing deal with Sharon, as mentioned above.
Whatever the outcome of the forthcoming Israeli elections, though, there is no hope of fully reviving the peace process, either on the Palestinian or the Syrian tracks, as long as Israel remains intransigent on the final status and border issues. Nor do the elections promise an end to the paralysis inside Israel that has come in the wake of the sharp rifts between the diverse political forces. If, indeed, Barak is intent on ending Israel's crisis he must adopt a new approach towards the peace process, one that entails full withdrawal from all Palestinian and Syrian occupied territory, since this is the only possible route to a just and lasting peace.
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