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FACTBOX-Israeli political parties
09 Dec 2008 11:10:04 GMT
 Source: Reuters
Dec 9 (Reuters) - Israel's right-wing Likud party led by Benjamin Netanyahu has chosen a slate of candidates for a Feb. 10 election which opinion polls have predicted he would win.

The 120 seats in the single-chamber Knesset are allocated by proportional representation to national party lists, which may secure seats after passing a minimum threshold of winning at least 2 percent of the national vote.

These are the main contenders for the next election:

KADIMA - Founded in 2005 by Prime Minister Ariel Sharon when he led much of Likud into an alliance with Labour rebels to promote a Gaza pullout. When Sharon fell into a coma, Ehud Olmert led Kadima to an election victory in 2006 but lost popularity over that year's Lebanon war. A graft scandal led to his resignation as prime minister in September, although he will stay on until a new government is elected. Olmert's successor as Kadima leader, Tzipi Livni, is Israel's chief negotiator in statehood talks with the Palestinians.

LIKUD - Filleted by Sharon, the main party of the right crashed to 12 seats in 2006. Its leader is Benjamin Netanyahu, who as finance minister and prime minister in the 1990s claimed credit for a hi-tech-led boom that followed his easing of state economic control. Likud backs a two-state solution to end the Palestinian conflict, but Netanyahu wants a Palestinian state to have limited powers.

LABOUR - Labour spearheaded talks with the Palestinians that led to land-for-peace accords in the 1990s under Yitzhak Rabin and Shimon Peres. Now led by Defence Minister Ehud Barak, who failed as prime minister from 1999 to 2001 to clinch peace deals with the Palestinians and Syria, the party is a partner with Kadima in the outgoing government. Opinion polls predict it could drop from 19 parliamentary seats to 8 in the election.

SHAS - A fixture in Israeli coalition governments, the ultra-Orthodox party effectively triggered the election by refusing to back Livni. Shas's supporters are drawn from religious Jews of Middle Eastern origin whose spiritual leader is the 88-year-old, Iraqi-born rabbi Ovadia Yosef.

YISRAEL BEITEINU - Avigdor Lieberman's Russian-accented Hebrew has been music to the ears of many of the million Israelis who came from the former Soviet Union since the 1980s. Now controlling 11 seats, the former Netanyahu aide says Israel's 1.5 million Arabs and some of their land should be "swapped" for West Bank Jewish settlements.

OTHER PARTIES - Nearly a third of parliamentary seats is held by minor parties. MERETZ (5 seats) is left-wing party not in the outgoing coalition. Along with a group of parties, HADASH, UNITED ARAB LIST and BALAD, representing Israel's Arab citizens and which together have 10 seats, it supports making concessions for peace. UNITED TORAH JUDAISM (6 seats) represents ultra-Orthodox Jews of Ashkenazi, or European, background. NATIONAL UNION/NRP (9), is an ultra-right religious coalition that demands an end to peace talks. Finally, the PENSIONERS have 7 seats and speak out for Israel's growing older population.


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Last updated:Tue Dec 9 11:12:02 2008