The new leader of Israel's Labor Party said on Thursday that he intended to pull his center-left party out of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's coalition government, a move almost certain to force the government to resign and hold new elections within months.
Amir Peretz, the country's most prominent labor union leader for the past decade, scored a major upset on Wednesday by ousting Shimon Peres as chairman of the Labor Party in a vote by members.
Peretz's surprise victory, with 42 percent of the vote to 40 percent for Peres, was announced at dawn on Thursday. Shortly afterward, Peretz said he would make good on his campaign promise to withdraw Labor from the coalition, based on his opposition to government economic policies that he said hurt poor and working-class Israelis.
The new Labor leader said he planned to meet Sharon today, with the intention of getting a commitment for a date for elections.
"We will notify the prime minister that we want to leave" the government, Peretz said.
After nearly five years as prime minister, Sharon retains broad public support. But his coalition has been weakened by rebellious members of his right-wing Likud Party who opposed his decision to withdraw Jewish settlers from the Gaza Strip. He managed to keep the coalition afloat based on support from the Labor Party, and he had hoped the government could serve out the full length of its term to November next year.
But without Labor's support in parliament, Sharon appeared to have little choice but to hold new elections sometime early next year.
Likud also will have to go through the process of selecting a party leader before the election, and Sharon faces a battle with his longtime rival, Benjamin Netanyahu, who opposed the Gaza pullout and who wants to replace him.
With Peres rejected by his party, and with Sharon facing a similar threat, two of Israel's longest-serving politicians find themselves fighting for political survival.
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