Barak Puts Right Foot Forward

Israel’s incoming prime minister, Ehud Barak, has built a coalition government from a broad spectrum of political parties sharing his dovish policies on peace negotiations with Israel’s Arab neighbors, but little else. Their divisions on domestic issues are particularly stark, and Barak has been astute in handing out Cabinet portfolios so as to neutralize some of the sharpest political differences among the seven coalition parties. He will need all that cunning to keep the coalition together while balancing peace negotiations and formidable political and economic problems at home.

Built on his centrist Labor Party, the Cabinet includes a motley collection of politicians from the ultra-Orthodox Shas Party on the right to the left-wing Meretz Party. Together, they occupy 75 seats in the 120-member Parliament, giving Barak a comfortable majority to lead sensitive Middle East peace negotiations. Adding 10 votes from the Israeli Arabs and at least eight from other parties not included in the coalition, Barak may have as many as 93 parliamentary votes for peace, based on the principle that Israel will have to give up land for a deal. That gives him a large margin to fulfill the promise on which he won the election eight weeks ago. Arab leaders, including President Hafez Assad of Syria and Palestine Liberation Organization head Yasser Arafat have reacted positively, pledging to work with Barak.

On the domestic front, Barak helped defuse the explosive issue of the role of religion in public life by stripping Shas of the Interior Ministry and handing it over to the Russian emigre party, Israel B’Aliya. No longer will Interior expel Russian emigres who don’t meet the religious right’s strict test of Jewishness.

The new prime minister inherits a moribund economy, which grew less than 0.3% in the first quarter of 1999, unemployment of close to 9%, declining foreign investment, a fiscal house in shambles and high interest rates. But the improved prospects for Middle East peace already have raised confidence among foreign investors who snapped up a recent Israeli bond issue. Domestic investors are sure to follow if interest rates decline from the current 12%.

The electorate gave Barak a clear mandate to reverse the confrontational and destructive policies of Netanyahu. He has taken the right first steps in fulfilling that mandate.