Sharon’s government faces collapse

ISRAEL’S march toward what appears to be an inevitable early election picked up speed yesterday after new Labour Party leader Amir Peretz threatened to act quickly to bring down Ariel Sharon’s government.

Mr Peretz’s call for Mr Sharon to meet him immediately to discuss a date for a new national ballot, or face a Labour move in the coming week to end their political alliance, was rejected out of hand by a top aide to the prime minister.

“With all due respect to politics, nothing can be done before Thursday,” said Cabinet Secretary Yisrael Maimon, citing a busy diplomatic schedule for Mr Sharon.

The political upheaval, following Mr Peretz’s surprise ousting of elder statesman Shimon Peres in a Labour leadership vote, is likely to put any resumption of violence-stalled peacemaking with the Palestinians even more firmly on hold. A US State Department official said a “political bargaining period” in Israel could make it harder for the US to push a peace agenda.

“What we don’t want here is to be kept in a holding pattern (because of domestic politics),” the official said.

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is to hold separate talks with Mr Sharon and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas today on ways to build on the Gaza Strip pullout in September.

Before leaving Saudi Arabia, Ms Rice said resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was a top priority and urged both sides to follow a US-sponsored peace “road map” for a Palestinian state alongside a secure Israel.

Hopes of a return to talks on the “road map” after Israel’s Gaza pullout remain unfulfilled.

Mr Peretz, in a television interview, said Labour “may act to topple the government on Wednesday” in the absence of a meeting with Mr Sharon before then.

The opposition National Religious Party is to present for preliminary approval in the Israeli legislature on Wednesday a bill calling to dissolve parliament.

Labour’s support is needed to send the bill to committee and then to the full plenum for passage in three separate votes that would set the ball rolling toward an election as early as February.

In any case, Mr Peretz has said he will propose an election in March or in May, advancing a vote not due until November 2006.

A pledge to leave Mr Sharon’s government over what Mr Peretz has called its neglect of Israel’s poor was a centrepiece of the 53-year-old trade union leader’s campaign to replace Mr Peres, 82. Palestinians are also preparing for an election in January that will mark the first time the militant Hamas group will take part in a legislative poll.