Netanyahu wins Likud leadership

Former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu won a primary to head the Likud Party in a March election against the leader who abandoned the party, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, just hours before Sharon was to be released from a Jerusalem hospital after treatment for a mild stroke.

Netanyahu, who quit Sharon’s cabinet in protest just before Israel’s summer pullout from Gaza and part of the West Bank, addressed happy backers early today and pledged to bring his party back to power.