A New Government Takes Office in Israel

Ehud Olmert was sworn in Thursday as Israel’s prime minister, leading a coalition he hopes can carry out his main campaign pledge: to set permanent national borders by withdrawing Jewish settlers from parts of the West Bank.

Olmert, a career politician named interim prime minister in January after Ariel Sharon suffered a massive stroke, has assembled a coalition representing four parties and 67 seats, a majority in the 120-member Israeli parliament, or Knesset. But some analysts were already labeling the alliance too spindly and political support too soft to easily implement Olmert’s partial withdrawal plan.

“I doubt very much if he will be able to implement a big plan,” said Efraim Inbar, director of the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies at Bar-Ilan University near Tel Aviv. “He may well go for a small plan.”

In a speech to lawmakers before the Knesset approved the new government, Olmert made clear that he intended to push for further withdrawals from mostly Palestinian areas in the West Bank to ensure Israel’s long-term viability. Such a move, which is probably more than a year away, would almost surely generate fierce opposition among settlers who view as a biblical birthright the notion of a “greater Israel” that includes the West Bank.

“I personally continue to advocate the idea of the entire land of Israel as a heart’s desire,” Olmert said. “I believe with all my heart in the people of Israel’s eternal historic right to the entire land of Israel. However, dreams and recognition of this right do not constitute a political program.

“Even if the Jewish eye cries, and even if our hearts are broken, we must preserve the essence,” he added. “We must preserve a stable and solid Jewish majority in our state.”

The new government is led by Olmert’s centrist Kadima party, founded by Sharon last fall after Israel’s withdrawal from the Gaza Strip and a small area of the West Bank. During March elections, voters gave majority support to parties that favor territorial concessions.

But Kadima won by a smaller-than-expected margin, forcing Olmert to reach out to other parties to achieve a majority coalition. Kadima, with 29 seats, has brought in the left-leaning Labor Party, the small, centrist Pensioners Party and the religious party Shas.

Olmert’s program -- whose Hebrew name, hitkansut, means “in-gathering” but is commonly translated here as “convergence” -- would involve removing settlers from outlying areas of the West Bank while solidifying Israel’s presence in major settlement blocks closer to Israel.

Olmert has said Israel would act unilaterally, if he deems there are no prospects for fruitful negotiations with the Palestinians. The prime minister is expected to start trying to build U.S. support for the planned withdrawal during a visit with President Bush in Washington this month.

Israeli analysts question whether the alliance, assembled during weeks of haggling, can withstand the domestic political tumult that will probably greet any move to reduce Israel’s presence in the West Bank.

“This is a government, halfway. It’s good enough to maybe push convergence through. But not good enough to push it through safely, comfortably,” said Reuven Hazan, a political science professor at Hebrew University in Jerusalem.

Olmert said Thursday that he hoped to broaden the coalition further by drawing in a second religious party, United Torah Judaism, and the dovish Meretz-Yahad. Adding both would give the coalition a base representing 78 seats, making it more difficult to topple the government if any party bolts.

Governing coalitions in Israel, often cobbled from parties with narrow interests and little in common, have proved relatively easy to topple. No coalition since the 1980s has managed to avoid early elections.

Although Olmert appears to enjoy a comfortable Knesset margin in favor of abandoning more of the West Bank, holding together a coalition that represents a parliamentary majority might prove difficult. That problem dogged Sharon, then the leader of the conservative Likud Party, during the months leading up to the Gaza pullout. In the end, he was forced to join with Labor to sustain his government through the withdrawal.

“I’ll be very surprised if this government lasts for four years, and very surprised if it does more than the initial legislation, taking the first steps toward removing several score settlements,” said Yossi Alpher, an Israeli analyst who co-edits a website called www.bitterlemons.org, which promotes dialogue between Israelis and Palestinians. “It certainly won’t be around to see the project through.”

Labor and the Pensioners eagerly signed on to Olmert’s border-setting plan, but Shas was allowed to join without committing itself to support of withdrawals. The party, made up mainly of ultra-Orthodox Jews of Middle Eastern descent, tends to be hawkish on security issues, and it is unclear whether it would stay in the government if asked to back evacuation of settlements.

Palestinian officials have warned Israel against unilateral actions, saying that only a negotiated settlement can bring peace by creating a viable independent Palestinian state alongside Israel.

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas has called for renewing peace talks, but prospects for negotiations have dimmed since the radical Islamic group Hamas took over after winning parliamentary elections in January.

The Bush administration on Thursday again called on Hamas to renounce terrorism and begin negotiations with Israel.

At the American Jewish Committee’s centennial dinner, Bush said: “Hamas has made it clear that they do not acknowledge the right of Israel to exist, and I’ve made it clear that so long as that’s their policy, we will have no contact with the leaders of Hamas.... Hamas must accept the demands of the international community to recognize Israel, disarm and reject terrorism and stop blocking the path to peace.”

In an interview published Thursday in the Israeli daily newspaper Maariv, Abbas expressed confidence that most Palestinians wanted a peace deal and said he would call a referendum to approve any proposed agreement.

Inbar of Bar-Ilan University said any discussion about negotiations on the Israeli side was “pro forma -- to keep the Europeans happy, the Americans happy.”

“Everyone knows this is not a real option,” Inbar said.

Olmert stirred controversy over some of his Cabinet choices, especially his decision to place the Defense Ministry under Labor Party boss Amir Peretz, a former union leader with little experience in security affairs.

Commentators noted that Olmert lacked the military credentials of Sharon, who lies comatose in a Jerusalem hospital, and that new Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni was also a relative novice on diplomatic and military matters.

“A government of rookies,” a headline in the daily newspaper Haaretz declared this week.

Olmert’s team will have little time to rest before facing its first challenges. The national budget for 2006, whose approval was delayed from last year, is to be introduced next week in the Knesset, the first step in a process that is often bruising. Later this year, the parliament will take up a separate spending plan for 2007.

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Israel’s Cabinet

* Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, 47, former Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s justice minister and a former operative with Israel’s foreign intelligence agency Mossad. A Kadima member, she retains the Cabinet post she had filled on an interim basis.

* Defense Minister Amir Peretz, 54, leader of the Labor Party and a former trade union chief. The Moroccan-born Peretz has little experience in government or military affairs, leading some Israelis to question how he would handle a security crisis.

* Finance Minister Abraham Hirchson, 65, a close ally of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert. Hirchson joined Kadima after Sharon defected from the right-wing Likud and formed the new party last year.

* Minister of Regional Development Shimon Peres, 82, Israel’s elder statesman, twice prime minister and a Nobel Peace Prize laureate. He left Labor after Peretz bested him in the party’s leadership race, joining Kadima.

* Justice Minister Haim Ramon, 56, also formerly of Labor and now with Kadima. A former leader of the Histadrut, Israel’s main labor federation, Ramon was an early advocate of the realignment of Israel’s political parties carried out by Sharon to capture the nation’s centrist voters.

* Transportation Minister Shaul Mofaz, born in 1948, was Sharon’s defense minister. Mofaz briefly ran for leadership of the conservative Likud Party after Sharon’s departure last fall before he joined Kadima.

Sources: Times staff and Associated Press

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