Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and Binyamin (Bibi) Netanyahu have dropped the gloves and are in a bare knuckles fight over the issue of whether to hold an early vote for the party's leadership. The Likud Central Committee will meet Sunday and Monday and vote on the demand by Netanyahu and MK Dr. Uzi Landau to hold the party primaries in late November. Sharon wants the vote to take place as scheduled, next April.
Sharon is losing ground among both Likud MKs and Central Committee members following his refusal to agree to the demand from some of his staunchest supporters that he pledge to remain in the Likud even if the party passes Netanyahu's proposal for November primaries. Many analysts say that a victory for Netanyahu in next week's vote on the date for primaries would be a clear signal that the committee's 3,000 members will vote against Sharon as the leader of the party.
Aides to Netanyahu are preparing for the possibility that Sharon will pre-empt a vote to oust him as leader and will dissolve the Knesset. The Netanyahu camp is trying to win the backing of 61 Knesset members to topple Sharon within the Knesset, a move that could result in Netanyahu becoming prime minister without new elections.
Shinui party members Eliezer Sandberg and Yosef Paritzky stated they will back a no-confidence vote against Sharon, according to Israel Army radio.
Sharon again attacked Netanyahu Friday, accusing him of trying to destroy the Likud party. "Whoever wants to commit suicide can go with Bibi," the Prime Minister said. Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz, a loyal Sharon supporter, entered the fray and told Central Committee members that if they vote for a November leadership vote, "Netanyahu will be remembered as the one who destroyed the Likud."
Polls continue to show a confused picture in which Sharon is losing popularity as Likud leader but is favored as the leader who will bring the Likud the most Knesset seats in the next general elections.
A poll on state-run Israel Radio Thursday said that 46 percent of the Central Committee favors early leadership elections and 41 percent are in favor of the April 2006 date. The number of those believing that Sharon will remain in the party regardless of the results is double the number of those who think he will leave.
Professional polling company Ma'agar Mochot, however, released a survey that shows party members giving Sharon a plurality as party leader, with 37 percent backing him, 33 percent supporting Netanyahu and 14 percent in favor of Dr. Landau.
Sharon would outdistance Netanyahu in general elections, according to a Yediot Aharonot daily poll which awards a Sharon-led Likud 36 seats, more than twice as many the Likud would receive if it were led by Netanyahu.
The final decision on when to hold Likud party primaries is dependent upon 400 central committee members who are undecided. Sharon's refusal to pledge loyalty to the Likud is his biggest stumbling block, because party members remember that the Prime Minister snubbed the party last year when he promised to abide by a party referendum on the expulsion plan. After losing the referendum by a landslide, he refused to accept the results and carried out the plan anyway. Fresh in the party members' minds is Sharon's bulldozing the expulsion plan through the Knesset and firing Cabinet ministers who opposed it.
Netanyahu verbally opposed the plan, but in fact voted in favor of expulsion until days before its implementation, when he ultimately resigned as Finance Minister.
"If Sharon will announce on the platform of the committee meeting that he promises not to leave the Likud even if he loses, he will walk away with the vote," said committee member Carmel Shama. "I am prepared to head the campaign for Arik [Sharon], but he must clearly say that the Likud is his home."
The loyalty issue also concerned committee member Tova Maoz of Ma'alot. "Until yesterday, I thought Arik would stay home [in the Likud]," she said, adding that she now has shifted her support to Netanyahu unless Sharon makes a loyalty oath.
Central Committee member Yossi Fuchs said Friday that the plan to advance the leadership vote has been in the works for a year. He said they delayed pushing for the vote because anti-expulsion Landau hoped the Knesset could stop the withdrawal. After Sharon passed all the Knesset hurdles, Dr. Landau accepted the idea of early primaries, and 600 members signed a petition obligating the Likud Central Committee to vote on advancing the date.