Tzipi Livni, the leader of ruling party Kadima, distanced herself Tuesday from outgoing Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's recipe for peace, as outlined by him Monday. Livni said that she was under no obligation to follow Olmert's ideas and that she would follow Kadima's platform instead.
"We can carry out negotiations my way without reaching the points presented by the outgoing Prime Minister," she said in a press statement she released in response to Olmert's speech Monday in which he called for a retreat to pre-1967 borders.
"As the chairwoman of the Kadima party, I am bound not by what the outgoing Prime Minister said but by the Kadima platform which I wrote, which I believe in and which sets precisely the principles for carrying out the negotiations," she explained.
Livni said that negotiations should not just yield a departure by Israel from parts of its homeland, but should also safeguard Jewish security and national interests. "This is how I intend to continue to manage t
"The future of the state of Israel... and of the region depends on the choice made by Israel's citizens [in the upcoming general elections]." 
his," she said. "Everyone accepts it, including the Palestinians and including the world."
Principles
She explained that Israel had set principles for negotiations at the 2006 Sharm el-Sheikh summit "together with the Palestinians, and with the support of the entire world."
"There were, there are and there will be disagreements between me and the outgoing Prime Minister, the Foreign Minister said. "When we wrote the Kadima platform, too, Olmert spoke in terms of 'convergence' by unilateral moves – which I think is a mistake, because you can't just throw the keys over to the other side and hope for the best…certainly not in Judea and Samaria," she explained.
Bibi or Tzipi?
Livni said that "the future of the state of Israel and of the [negotiating] process and of the region depends on the choice made by Israel's citizens [in the upcoming general elections]." She added that the choice people had to make was between her and Likud Chairman Binyamin Netanyahu.
The Likud has sharpened distinctions between its platform and Kadima's by stating that it will not give up the Golan Heights and will retain Jerusalem as Israel's undivided capital. Livni has not said she supports surrendering the areas but has insisted that the issues will be decided in negotiations.