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Israel's Netanyahu fails to lure rivals to cabinet
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Israel's Netanyahu fails to lure rivals to cabinet
AFP - Tuesday, February 24
JERUSALEM (AFP) - - Benjamin Netanyahu failed on Monday to persuade top rivals to join his cabinet, increasing the chances of a right-wing Israeli coalition that is likely to put the brakes on the sputtering Middle East peace process.
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Both outgoing Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, head of the centrist Kadima party, and centre-left Labour party leader and current Defence Minister Ehud Barak have waved aside entreaties to enter a Netanyahu government.
The intense political horsetrading comes as senior envoys from the administration of new US President Barack Obama prepare to visit the region to try to advance peace talks which have been on ice since the Gaza war.
Barak emerged from a meeting with Netanyahu on Monday still intent on taking Labour to the opposition benches after the veteran party made its worst-ever showing in the February 10 election with just 13 seats.
"The people have spoken and decided to send Labour into the opposition and we respect their choice," Barak said. "We will be a responsible, serious and constructive opposition."
After talks with Netanyahu on Sunday, Livni said Kadima would not enter a government headed by the right-wing Likud leader and former premier but nevertheless left the door ajar, agreeing to meet him again.
"We didn't reach any agreement," Livni said. "There is an essential divergence and we have to clarify if there is a possible common path. We didn't make progress on any essential subjects."
She said the main difference centred on the principle of a two-state solution to the decades-old Israeli-Palestinian conflict, which Livni supports.
"On the essential subject for arriving at a (coalition) agreement -- that there should be two states for two peoples and a final accord with the Palestinians -- there is no agreement," said Livni, who has been leading Israel's negotiations with the Palestinians.
Bibi, as Netanyahu is known, put a more positive spin on the encounter, saying "we found many common points that require further meetings. We are trying to find a common path."
Although he can theoretically count on support from fellow right-wingers for a 65-bloc in the 120-member parliament, Netanyahu is believed to favour a broad coalition that will have a better chance of surviving in the notoriously unstable world of Israeli politics.
"He is terrified by the possibility that he will have to present a narrow government to Barack Obama," the Maariv newspaper wrote. "It keeps him awake at night."
Although Likud won 27 seats in the election -- one less than Kadima -- Netanyahu has been tasked with forming the next cabinet as he stands a better chance of cobbling together a coalition by an April 3 deadline.
The former premier favours a broad alliance over a purely right-wing coalition that would be unlikely to last a full term and would put Israel at odds with Obama's administration.
The US president's Middle East peace envoy, former senator George Mitchell, was expected in Israel and the West Bank within days while US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was to make her first official visit next week, according to senior Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erakat.
Netanyahu headed a right-wing government when he became Israel's youngest prime minister in 1996, but it fell apart three years later when small far-right parties quit in protest over deals he struck with the Palestinians under US pressure.
Netanyahu had agreed to hand over control of parts of the West Bank city of Hebron to the Palestinians. But he also put the brakes on the peace process, in part by authorising an expansion of Jewish settlements in the territory.
Israel's system of proportional representation usually forces premiers to secure coalition partners among the myriad of smaller parties, resulting in governments that are notoriously unstable.
If Netanyahu becomes prime minister, it would be the first time in Israeli history that the leader of the party winning the most seats in parliament fails to take the helm of government.
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