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| Israel-Palestine-Jordan |
| Israel votes on new leader to replace Olmert |
| 2008-09-18 |
| Israel's governing Kadima party was voting for a new leader on Wednesday, with Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni favoured by opinion polls to replace scandal-plagued Prime Minister Ehud Olmert. But whether Tzipi Livni or fellow cabinet minister Shaul Mofaz secures the support of a majority of the 74,000 members of the centrist Kadima party, Olmert may stay on as caretaker premier for weeks or months -- and Israel's fractious coalition politics could yet mean an early parliamentary election. "At some moment in the near future, I will decide what to do with the rest of my life," Olmert, facing possible indictment in a corruption investigation, told community service volunteers in southern Israel. After what many had thought might be his last such meeting with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on Tuesday, Olmert vowed to carry on with their peace negotiations -- a sign he aims to exercise his right to continue as prime minister while his successor as party leader tries to form a new government. Polls show Foreign Minister Livni well ahead of Mofaz, the transport minister and a former general, in her bid to become Israel's first woman leader since Golda Meir in the 1970s. But despite Livni's commanding lead, Mofaz remained upbeat. "I stand behind my belief that I am going to win," he said after voting near Tel Aviv. Whoever succeeds Olmert, many see a parliamentary election in months. Kadima, founded in 2005 by Ariel Sharon, has just a quarter of the seats in the Knesset. Rivals, some within Olmert's coalition, are preparing for a national battle that polls show may favour Benjamin Netanyahu's right-wing Likud. |
| Posted by:Fred |