Poll: Likud rebounds with new leader

Israel’s right-wing Likud party has strengthened slightly after the election of Benjamin Netanyahu as its new leader to campaign in national polls in March.

Netanyahu will lead the party to elections in March

The latest opinion poll published on Wednesday in the Haaretz newspaper suggested the party was starting to bounce back after being devastated by the departure of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.

The survey predicted Likud would win 14 seats in the 120-member parliament – a huge drop from its current 40 but a better showing than the 12 seats forecast in a previous poll.

Likud dominated Israeli politics for much of the past three decades, but its standing collapsed after Sharon and several other leading figures bolted to form the centrist Kadima party ahead of the March 28 national elections.

The poll underscored surveys taken following Sharon’s  admission to hospital for a mild stroke this week that Kadima would win 39 to 40 seats, putting it in place to form the next coalition government.

The centre-left Labour Party dropped slightly from 24 seats to 21, the poll indicated.

It found Labour had stagnated despite the new leadership of fiery former trade union leader Amir Peretz, possibly due to the defection of elder statesman Shimon Peres who has announced his support for Kadima.

Source: Reuters