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Photo: Gil Yohanan
'People will come back home to Likud.' Landau
Photo: Gil Yohanan
Photo: Eli Algarat
Sivan Shalom
Photo: Eli Algarat

Likud regroups amid ominous polls

Senior party members, including Benjamin Netanyahu, Silvan Shalom, convene following polls showing party set to gain only 10 Knesset seats in March general elections; decide on ‘Vote Sharon – get Peres’ as campaign slogan

Vote Sharon, get Peres – this is the message Likud will convey during its election campaign, party members decided on Wednesday amid ominous polls published earlier in the day.

 

Senior Likud members, including MK Benjamin Netanyahu and Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom, convened to discuss the party’s strategy; among other things, it was decided Likud would focus on criticizing Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s Kadima party.

 

Likud’s campaign will aim to key messages: The first pertains to the aforementioned “Vote Sharon – get Peres” slogan, meaning a vote for Kadima will pave the way for the Left’s return to power. The second campaign slogan will be “Likud – guarding the home.”

 

Following the meeting, MK Uzi Landau addressed the polls pointing to the party’s possible collapse in the upcoming elections, saying, “As soon as a new party chairman is elected, people will begin to return home to Likud, despite attempts to present a distorted picture. The voters will decide.”

 

Likud lags behind Shas

 

Silvan Shalom said, “Today’s polls are insignificant. Likud is strong and has loyal supporters; everything will become simpler once the party’s candidate for prime minister is elected.”

 

Party Chairman Tzachi Hanegbi added, “We will act against our political rivals as though there is no internal race for party leadership, and we will hold internal Likud elections as though there are no general elections on the horizon.”

 

According to a new poll conducted by the Dahaf Institute, published Wednesday in Israel's leading newspaper Yedioth Ahronot, Likud would gain only 10 Knesset seats were the elections held today.

 

In last week's Dahaf poll , the Likud received 13 Knesset seats.

  

The Likud's situation is so bad, that even Shas overpasses it in the poll with 11 Knesset seats.

 

Sharon and Labor Chairman Amir Peretz can be quite satisfied with the survey's findings. Peretz receives 27 seats in the poll, while Sharon wins with 34 seats for his new party Kadima.

 

Attila Somfalvi contributed to the report

 


פרסום ראשון: 11.30.05, 17:13
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