Opposition leader Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday accused rival faction Kadima of planning to make sweeping concessions over Jerusalem to the Palestinians. "For the first time in the history of our nation, we come upon a development that we are unfamiliar with and that we cannot remember whereby the ruling party in our midst will come and offer up Jerusalem even to the worst of our enemies," Netanyahu said during an appearance at a Jerusalem conference commemorating 70 years since the founding of the Rabbi Kook Institute. Also in attendance at the event was Shas spiritual leader Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, who uncharacteristically showered praise on the Likud chairman. Yosef referred to Netanyahu as "my dear, beloved friend" who "does a great deal for the Torah."
Meanwhile, Deputy Prime Minister Shaul Mofaz (Kadima) on Sunday vowed to form a coalition government before local authority elections on November 11. "Israel does not need general elections now, in light of the existential challenges facing us," Mofaz said, during his speech at an election rally for the Kiryat Ono municipal elections.
Mofaz, who is locked in what is widely regarded to be a two-person race for the Kadima chairmanship against Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, said last Friday that the latest poll numbers indicating an advantage in favor of his rival in the Kadima Party primaries in September are bound to change. "I wouldn't advise anyone to base the future on polls," Mofaz said on Friday. "[The polls] are a mood, and this will change. I'm sure that I will win the primaries."
Livni would lead Kadima to victory over Likud if elections were held today, according to a special poll conducted by Dialog last Thursday on behalf of Haaretz.
For all the bitter struggle between Livni and Mofaz, Thursday's poll, conducted a day after Olmert announced that he would not seek re-election as Kadima's leader, shows that the foreign minister is the only politician who currently has enough public support to defeat Likud Chairman Benjamin Netanyahu. The poll of 503 Israelis, which has a margin of error of 4.1 percent, showed that in national elections, Kadima headed by Livni would win 26 seats in the Knesset, compared to 25 for Likud under Netanyahu. Netanyahu has consistently led in the polls for the past two years, but Thursday's survey seems to indicate that the political arena is changing.