Israeli Arabs could oust Netanyahu

THE THREE Jewish candidates in next month's elections for Israeli prime minister are learning the hard way that wooing the Arab minority, which accounts for 12 per cent of the electorate, is a tricky business.

The right-wing Likud party's incumbent, Benjamin Netanyahu, was greeted with everything from polite scepticism to outright hostility when he visited Muslim communities celebrating Id al Adha (the Feast of the Sacrifice) early this week. In the Western Galilee town of Shefaram, he was denounced as an "enemy of peace" and roundly told he was not welcome. He completed his tour, all the same.

In 1996, Mr Netanyahu defeated Shimon Peres by less than 1 per cent of the total vote. It looks likely to be just as close this time. Every vote, however unlikely, is worth fighting for. Someone, somewhere, might take seriously his last-minute promise of equality and public funding for the Arab sector, pounds 4m in one year for Shefaram alone.

When the Centre Party's Yitzhak Mordechai visited the Muslim stronghold of Kafr Kassem, the leader of Israel's Islamic Movement, Sheikh Abdullah Nimr Darwish, urged the former defence minister to make common cause with Labour's Ehud Barak to avoid splitting the anti-Netanyahu vote. The Arabs, he explained, would go to the polls first time round to vote for their own parliamentary candidates (and while they were at it, cast a separate ballot for prime minister), but they could not be relied on to go back two weeks later if no prime ministerial contender won the necessary 50 per cent. "We can't let Netanyahu make it to a second round," Sheikh Darwish insisted.

Two opinion polls, published yesterday, gave Mr Mordechai a maximum of 17 per cent in the first round, compared with 36 per cent for Mr Netanyahu and 33 per cent for Mr Barak. In a second round, both Mr Barak and Mr Mordechai would edge out Mr Netanyahu.

t A 19-year-old Palestinian who was shot in the pelvis during Muslim riots nine years ago is to receive 50,000 shekels (pounds 8,000) from the Israeli government to buy Viagra. Doctors said the injury had impaired his sexual capability and recommended Viagra. The court awarded him 630,000 shekels, but said that only 50,000 should go on the anti-impotence drug.