Netanyahu Dodges Political Bullet--for Now

After a day of intense political wrangling, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday fended off perhaps the most serious challenge to date to his fragile government, which has been badly split over the latest peace deal with the Palestinians.

The reprieve is only temporary, however. It resulted from a procedural ploy in parliament by a coalition ally to keep the Israeli leader in power through a planned visit by President Clinton at the end of the week and to bolster his government before a no-confidence vote Dec. 21.

Monday’s scramble for votes highlighted the difficulties Netanyahu faces in trying to stay in power.

His coalition of right-wing and religious parties has been in open rebellion since he agreed in October to the U.S.-brokered accord to cede more West Bank land to the Palestinians. The opposition Labor Party initially gave him a safety net to allow the government to survive while the agreement was implemented but withdrew it last week after Netanyahu’s Cabinet suspended the next phase of troop pullbacks from the West Bank.

Netanyahu wooed first one tiny party, then another and another--from across the political spectrum--but all turned him down, unwilling to give up their berths in the opposition.

“They came to bring down the government. They put it off, and I was happy,” Netanyahu told reporters after his narrow escape. “The opposition wanted to see the coalition break down today, and it didn’t get that.”

Differences over the increasingly troubled accord also sparked new violence in the West Bank, where dozens of Palestinians and a handful of Israelis were injured in shootings and clashes. Much of the violence grew out of protests over the continued detention by Israel of people Palestinians regard as political prisoners.

The Palestinians argue that Israel is violating the accord reached at Wye Plantation in Maryland by refusing to release the prisoners, many of whom were responsible for violent acts against Israelis. Netanyahu has said he will never free prisoners with “blood on their hands,” or members of Hamas and other militant groups.

In Washington, Israeli Foreign Minister Ariel Sharon accused the Palestinian Authority of fomenting the unrest, which he described as a new intifada, the Arabic word for uprising. He said the violence had made it difficult for the peace process to move forward. Sharon was in Washington for meetings with U.S. officials.

In the most serious incident Monday, Palestinian police in the northern West Bank city of Nablus opened fire on Palestinians protesting rough treatment by the officers at a demonstration earlier in the day. Nineteen people were injured after the police fired on an angry crowd that was using stones and bottles to try to break into police headquarters, witnesses said.

Earlier Monday, mothers of prisoners had demonstrated in Nablus, criticizing both Israel and the Palestinian Authority for their sons’ continued imprisonment in Israeli jails. The police used clubs to beat several of the women as they pushed them back.

That sparked the second demonstration, this time by activists of Fatah--the political movement started by Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat--who surrounded the headquarters and set fire to several police cars.

In other violence, a Jewish settler was shot and wounded in the northern West Bank as he drove toward his home in the settlement of Ganim. The Israeli army said Palestinians were suspected in the attack.

And an Israeli civilian opened fire on Palestinian stone-throwers who had surrounded his car near Jerusalem. Two Palestinian teenagers were wounded, one critically, hospital officials said.

The turmoil came just days before Clinton is scheduled to arrive Saturday for a visit to Israel and Palestinian areas that is intended to celebrate the agreement he guided to completion in the October summit.

The stormy parliament session came as legislators began debate on a bill to force an early national election. Labor Party leader Ehud Barak said he had the votes to pass the bill on the first of three required readings, which would have dealt a major blow to Netanyahu and set the stage for elections, probably in the spring.

But after six hours of debate, including a filibuster by a lawmaker from Netanyahu’s Likud Party to buy him some maneuvering time, United Torah Judaism, a small ultra-Orthodox Jewish party in the coalition, submitted the no-confidence motion.

Under parliamentary rules, a week must pass between a no-confidence motion and a vote. Because of the Clinton visit, the opposition said the bill would be put off for an additional week.