Labour to pull out of Sharon coalition

ISRAEL’S Labour Party last night voted to pull out of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s coalition government, virtually assuring early general elections in March.

The decision came in a show of hands at a Labour Party convention in Tel Aviv, following the wishes of the new party leader, Amir Peretz, who collected letters of resignation from the Labour cabinet ministers last week.

In his first campaign speech, Mr Peretz, addressing the convention, emphasised domestic economic issues.

Mr Peretz, a fiery union leader, said Mr Sharon’s government had deepened poverty and “humiliated” the poor and immigrants.

He called on Mr Sharon’s Likud Party supporters from Israel’s lower classes to switch to Labour.

“Come join the new social pact,” he said, “You are not abandoning Likud. Likud has abandoned you.”

Mr Peretz was speaking at a party convention expected to approve withdrawal of Labour from Mr Sharon’s ruling coalition.

In a brief reference to the traditional election decider in Israel - security and the Palestinian issue - Mr Peretz said he favoured a united Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and opposed permitting Palestinian refugees to return to Israel.

Mr Sharon, meanwhile, is considering leaving the Likud Party he helped create in 1973, a move that would scramble the political scene ahead of the election.

Though Mr Sharon has not announced his decision, politicians and Israeli media speculated he would set up a new party after Likud split over the pullout.

Also, Palestinians are concentrating on their own parliamentary election, set for January 25, with the violent Islamic Hamas running candidates for the first time and posing a significant challenge to the ruling Fatah Party of Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas.