Israeli Prime Minister-designate Tzipi Livni has run into roadblocks in her cabinet-making process this week, as coalition talks with a potential kingmaker party is seemingly tottering toward breakdown.
With just 10 days left for her to cobble together a government within the 42-day time limit, the woman leader of the ruling Kadima party encountered a strong setback on Wednesday night when the ultra-Orthodox Shas party turned down her coalition offer.
Ha'aretz daily quoted Shas lawmakers as saying that Livni's offer to transfer 800 million shekels (208.28 million U.S. dollars)to child stipends and various religious institutions was insufficient.
Local news service Ynet put the price tag at 650 million shekels (169.27 million dollars), and quoted Shas officials as saying they would not settle for less than a billion shekels.
Yet Livni is not poised to make any more generous gestures to Shas, saying that she was not completely convinced that Shas wants to join her government.
Negotiating teams from both parties met again on Thursday. Ynet cited a Shas official as saying that developments were made on some of the relevant issues, but the party's main issue, child allowances, remains resolved.
In another blow to Livni's cabinet-making efforts, negotiators from the Pensioners' Party canceled a planned meeting with Kadima representatives.
The party chairman Rafi Eitan was quoted as saying that a draft earlier submitted by Kadima "proves that the pensioners are not at the top of the designated government's agenda."
Although standing as the largest party, Kadima possesses only 29 seats in the 120-seat parliament, and thus has to rule in the form of a coalition government.
Earlier this month, Livni secured an initial coalition agreement with the second largest party Labor, boasting the number of seats to 48.
The Shas party, the third largest political faction with 12 seats and a participant in the outgoing Kadima-led coalition, is Livni's non-negligible option, with which she would guarantee a convenient majority in the parliament, as some smaller parties have voiced their willingness to join her line.
Even without Shas, the former Mossad intelligence agent would probably succeed in patching together a narrow coalition. Local newspaper The Jerusalem Post reported Thursday that Livni is lobbying for support for such a possible scenario.
SUNDAY IS DECISION DAY
As the Nov. 3 deadline is pressing nearer, Livni seems losing patience, saying Thursday that she will made a decision by Sunday on whether to form a new government or opt for an early general election.
"Decisions need to be made by Sunday, and then we will know whether we'll have a government or elections," she was quoted by local media as saying at a Kadima meeting.
She has vowed to present a coalition to the parliament on Monday, the first day of the legislature's winter session.
Apparently, the would-be second woman premier in Israel's history now faces three options: a wide coalition with Shas, a narrow one without it or an early general election.
Although talks with Shas are stalled, senior Shas officials told Ynet that their leader Eli Yishai may be willing to consider reducing the demands. "Yishai wants to be in the government, but only he feels that the issue of child allowances is handled to Shas' satisfaction," said a senior Shas member.
Should Shas finally say No, it is still unclear whether a narrow coalition would obtain parliamentary approval, a prerequisite for any government to be instated.
Yishai on Thursday vowed that his party would vote against any narrow coalition Livni would present to the parliament, and some Kadima lawmakers have also voiced opposition.
As the cabinet-making prospect is anything but bright, an early general election does not seem like a better choice.
Recent polls showed that the current main opposition party Likud, which has ruled out any possibility to join a Livni government and has also been persuading Shas to follow its suit, would emerge as the biggest winner.
However, a confident Livni told her fellow party members that should an early general election be held, possibly in the spring, "we'll win. "
Source:Xinhua
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