Profiles : Dr. No & Mr. Maybe : Shamir and Rabin have faced off many times before. Now their well-worn stands appear vital to the future.

The election race for prime minister of Israel is not exactly a battle of new faces.

Yitzhak Shamir, 76, has reigned as prime minister longer than any Israeli leader since founding father David Ben-Gurion. Shamir’s slow cadence and shrugged shoulders are as familiar to Israelis as the stone walls around old Jerusalem. His stands on the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip (that they belong to Israel) and on Israel’s formidable economic and immigration problems (form a committee) are anything but new.

Then there’s Yitzhak Rabin, 70, who occupied the prime minister’s office 15 years ago and had been prominent long before because of his wartime heroics. His gravelly voice, hardened by chain smoking, and his deadpan demeanor are known to three generations of Israelis. His positions on the disputed territory (give some of it up) and on Israel’s domestic ills (get money from Washington) have been consistent over time.

Shamir, whom pundits have dubbed Dr. No, meets Rabin, Mr. Maybe.

A new world power landscape and pressing domestic needs have lent an aura of drama to this head-on confrontation and made well-worn stands appear critical to Israel’s future. Will the Middle East conflict long outlast the end of the Cold War, not to mention the Gulf War? Or will Israel and Arab neighbors, under the umbrella of U.S. leadership, make peace?

Whatever the outcome, the election will be the first step in a generational change in Israel. Shamir, standard-bearer of the right-wing Likud Party, is the last potential leader of Israel whose formative years date to before and during World War II. His world view is colored by the Holocaust and by mistrust of outsiders. Rabin, of the left-of-center Labor Party, represents the generation of the 1948 founding of Israel. His defeat would be the last shot at power for his group of state builders.

“These are the last candidates from revolutionary Israel,” remarked historian Benny Morris. “The next crop come from established, institutional Israel.”

Shamir’s long stay in power is a surprise to almost everyone in politics. When Likud selected him to replace Menachem Begin in 1983, he was regarded as a caretaker. As colorless as Shamir is in public, he has been nimble within Likud, mastering the back-room deals that keep political rivals at bay.

Such savvy is perhaps unusual in a man whose previous career was confined to the dark recesses of undercover warfare and intelligence work. In pre-independence days, he operated with the Stern Gang, which carried out a terror war against the British and Arabs during the three-sided conflict for control of Palestine.

As one of the top leaders, he approved the executions of Count Folke Bernadotte--a U.N. representative--as well as a renegade member of his own organization, according to various accounts.

After Israel’s statehood, he entered business for a while, but he eventually joined the Mossad, Israel’s overseas intelligence agency. He entered public life in the service of Begin, who in 1977 rousted the Labor Party from power for the first time. Shamir’s uncompromising stands emerged early. In the Knesset, or Parliament, he opposed the 1979 Camp David peace treaty with Egypt. In fact, he still suggests that some outlines for Palestinian self-rule in the treaty do not apply.

Israel’s invasion of Lebanon in 1982 and the aftermath drove Begin from power in 1983, and Shamir took over. He maneuvered within and at the head of uneasy coalitions with Labor, undermining moves to start talks with Arab neighbors. When he was able to cobble together a right-wing coalition 2 1/2 years ago, Shamir could accelerate his fondest project: settling the West Bank and Gaza with Israelis.

In the short period since then, he has increased the Jewish population of the Israeli-held territories by 30%, to nearly 120,000, and has built housing for many more expected to come.

He boasted during the current election campaign that if he wins, settlement will put so many Israelis on the land that “no one will be able to talk about territorial compromise” with the Palestinians, who claim the land as their own and have been battling the Israeli occupation since 1987.

Shamir occasionally warms up at rallies, where he whips supporters into a frenzy of delight with references to Palestinians as “brutal, savage invaders” and to all the occupied land as the “property of one people, the Jewish people.”

The emergence of the United States as the sole Middle East steward and the Bush Administration’s willingness to put life into dormant American policy seem to have caught Shamir off guard. He once referred to President Bush’s opposition to Israeli settlement of the West Bank and Gaza as a “bad dream.” The White House says the settlements hinder peace efforts.

But there is only one element on the world stage that seems truly important to Shamir: the force of Israel’s will. In his view, compromise is dangerous and friends can’t be trusted. Most observers date that mind-set to the Holocaust experience of Shamir, who was born in Poland. Members of his family were cut down by German Nazis, and his father was killed by Poles the family had regarded as friends.

In comments to a reporter last year, he suggested he could never surrender the West Bank and Gaza or any part of it.

Yitzhak Rabin, born in Jerusalem, belongs to a generation dubbed the Golden Israelis, a rugged new breed of Jew who had risen, with the state, out of the ashes of the Holocaust. His exploits during the 1948 War of Independence were models for heroes in Leon Uris’ epic novel “Exodus.” And his leadership in Israel’s victory in the 1967 Middle East War, when he was armed forces chief of staff, pushed him into a political career as a protege of Golda Meir.

Rabin went to Washington as ambassador from 1968 to 1973, a civilian tenure that saved him from being stained with Israel’s mixed showing in the 1973 Middle East War. He took over from a shaky Prime Minister Golda Meir in 1974.

Three years later, discovery of an illegal bank account in Washington led to his resignation. In the ensuing election, Likud’s Begin won, and the long eclipse of Labor began. From then on, Rabin was locked into a battle of attrition with his chief rival for leadership of the Labor Party--Shimon Peres. Never much of a backslapper and slightly disdainful of nitty-gritty party organization, Rabin was unable to unseat Peres until last year, when a party primary took place.

Liberals, eager to erase their soft-on-the-Arabs image, rejected Peres in favor of Rabin, who had served as defense minister in 1984-90 and styled his policy toward rebellious Palestinians and their uprising as the “iron fist.”

At the beginning of the uprising, known in Arabic as the intifada , Rabin had approved a controversial policy of beatings. He also permitted liberalized firing rules that sharply increased casualties among protesters.

But is Rabin truly a dove in hawk’s clothing or merely another version of Shamir, albeit one capable of smoothing relations with the United States?

Rabin differs from Shamir on the key question of compromise with the Palestinians. He is willing to give up territory to the Palestinians so long as an independent state does not arise; he foresees Jordan ruling over the rump territories.

Meanwhile, a noisy feature of the current campaign has been a series of attacks on Rabin’s character. But Rabin dismissed the clamor, insisting that the smears show that Likud is “worried about me.”

The worry may be justified. Latest polls show Rabin and Labor leading Shamir and Likud, with Labor getting anywhere from 40 to 43 seats, while Likud is shown winning 32 to 34. A plurality for Labor would give it an advantage in subsequent bargaining with minor parties to form a majority in the 120-member Parliament.

YITZHAK SHAMIR * October, 1915 -- Born in Ruzimir, Poland. * 1935 -- Emigrated to Palestine. Shamir later lost his family in the Holocaust, killed by Nazis and Nazi sympathizers. * 1937 -- Joined the Irgun Zva’i Leumi (National Military Organization) * 1940s -- Founder and member of Lohamei Herut Yisrael (Israel Freedom Fighters), widely known as the Stern Gang, which carried out a terror war against the British and Arabs during the struggle for control of Palestine. He was imprisoned twice by British authorities but managed to escape both times. * 1948-54 -- In 1948, the new nation of Israel outlawed his group, forcing him into exile in Eritrea and France. When he returned, he tried his hand as a businessman. * 1955-65 -- Joined Mossad, Israel’s intelligence service, eventually becoming a top official. * 1965-70 -- Engaged in private commercial activity. * 1970 -- Joined the Herut Movement, the forerunner of Likud. * December, 1973 -- Elected to the eighth Knesset on the Herut ticket. * 1977 -- Elected to ninth Knesset and Speaker of the House. * March, 1980 -- Appointed minister of foreign affairs * October, 1983 -- Became Israel’s seventh prime minister. * October, 1984 -- Assumed position of vice premier. * October 1986 -- Returned to prime minister’s post. In December, 1987, the intifada began--a series of demonstrations and civil disobedience against Israeli rule in the occupied Gaza Strip and West Bank. Shamir’s government was condemned by world opinion for the severity used in trying to crush the rebellion.

YITZHAK RABIN * March, 1922 -- Born in Jerusalem. * 1943-48 -- Palmach (pre-independence fighting unit) commander, later took part in War of Independence. * 1949 -- Represented the Israel Defense Forces at the Rhodes armistice negotiations. * 1956-59 -- Commander in chief, Northern Command * 1959-63 -- Deputy chief of staff and, later, chief, General Staff. * 1964-1968 -- Chief of staff of the Israeli Defense Forces, including during the Six-Day war in June, 1967. That war ended with Israel in control of the West Bank, the Gaza Strip, the Sinai Peninsula and Golan Heights. * 1968-1973 -- Served as Israel’s ambassador to the United States. * 1973 -- Elected to the eighth Knesset * 1974 -- Named Minister of labor by Prime Minister Golda Meir. * 1974-1977 -- Served as prime minister following the resignation of Meir. * 1984-1990 -- Minister of defense. * February, 1992 -- Elected Chairman of the Labor Party.

Sources: Europa World Yearbook 1992, International Who’s Who

Compiled by Times’ Researchers Kevin Fox and Tom Lutgen