Israel's
national elections Tuesday left the Obama administration and its allies with a
new prospect: a weakened Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, whose years of
testiness and occasional confrontation with President Barack Obama failed to
prevent the rise of a new centrist party.
Israel's
election — and the emergence as the country's second-largest party of Yesh
Atid, led by former television personality Yair Lapid — were driven largely by
domestic economic and social issues. But it surprised many who had anticipated
the victory of a militant right-wing bloc. And Washington was scrambling
Tuesday to process what appears to be a new, more centrist coalition in a year
that could test American-Israeli relations over a brewing conflict with Iran
and an American desire to move toward Palestinian statehood.
According
to the Israel's Channel 2, with 95% of votes counted, Likud-Beiteinu had won 31
seats, while Lapid's party won 19, and Labor won 17.
"The
net impact is that a broader coalition may provide more openings as part of a
renewal of peace negotiations with the Palestinians," said David Makovsky,
the director of the Project on the Middle East Peace Process at the Washington
Institute for Near East Policy, though he also predicted protracted bargaining
in the "Rubik's cube" of Israeli coalition politics.
"Another
incentive for a wider coalition is the biggest issue in play between Washington
and Israel this year is Iran," Makovsky said. "Accordingly, Israel
will need to prioritize relations with the Obama administration towards
reaching a successful resolution."
That
fact, and Lapid's demand that negotiations be restarted with Palestinian
leaders, have offered backers of the peace process a rare reason for optimism.
"I
think Netanyahu forming a coalition with partners who demand peace negotiations
with Palestinians, that's good for Obama," said Peace Now spokesman Ori
Nir.
And
while Obama may have been burned once too often by the difficult politics of
Israel and Palestinian, the eternally optimistic peace processers are hoping
for a new champion: his incoming Secretary of State, Senator John Kerry.
"There's
a lot of buzz going around that Kerry wants to own this issue," said Zvika
Krieger, a vice president at the S. Daniel Abraham Center for Middle East Peace
and contributing editor to The Atlantic. "If Kerry does in fact request
that, we might see some movement on this issue."
Another
Democratic Mideast analyst said Netanyahu would be pulled in both directions by
his new coalition. A centrist coalition may make "it easier to get some
things done, which could please the White House, but he will also face real
pressure from the right and within his own base, which will also give him a pressure
release valve," the analyst said.
Others
shrugged off the heated rhetoric surrounding the elections' impact both here
and in Israel.
Writing
in Bloomberg View, Jeffrey Goldberg argued (Will Israel’s Election Help the Peace Process? http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-01-22/will-israel-s-election-help-the-pe
ace-process-jeffrey-goldberg.html) that the effect of the election
results on the peace process would be " not as much as you'd expect."
"In
the past week, especially, Netanyahu has been running against President Barack
Obama," Goldberg wrote. "Netanyahu had been trying to convey to the settlers
and their supporters that he is the only one strong enough to resist another
U.S. pressure campaign to freeze Israeli settlement-building."
"The
next coalition — even if it is center-right, rather than hard-right —is going
to have a hard time selling a revitalized peace process," Goldberg wrote.
Meanwhile,
Netanyahu appeared to signal (In Israel, Netanyahu's party wins but centrists flex muscle, polls show -http://www.cnn.com/2013/01/22/world/meast/israel-elections/index.html)
a preference for a centrist coalition, telling supporters Tuesday night that his
government will be "as broad as possible."
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