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Last update - 04:38 11/12/2008 Bibi, not Feiglin By Israel Harel Tags: Moshe Feiglin, Israel News  Benjamin Netanyahu is angry. He is complaining that his opponents are using Moshe Feiglin's high placement on the party ticket to vilify Likud. That is true. But who gave them powerful ammunition to bash the Likud chairman relentlessly? Netanyahu. He, who fought Feiglin with brawn rather than brains, brought it on himself and his party. The power with which Netanyahu fought Feiglin and the efforts he put into recruiting votes from the center and left proved that he was not reading the past months' electoral map correctly and is not familiar with the genetic code of the party he leads. Likud members made it clear in the primary (and the polls two days later) that they do not want a "center" party like the ones that have been leading Israel in the past two decades in a bloody, dead-end labyrinth. We are giving Likud (not necessarily Netanyahu), even with Feiglin, a majority of 11 Knesset seats over Kadima (the Haaretz-Dialog poll after the primary), so that he would have the power to be different from the others. And he will only be different if the ticket does not include candidates who espouse Kadima or Labor positions. Advertisement As far as the peace process is concerned, the primary results faithfully reflect the voters' desire that Likud remain true to its ways, not a mix stretching from Feiglin nearly to Meretz. Such a voter wants a party that will carry out, especially in security matters, a U-turn and put an end to the Qassam rockets in the south and the shameful surrenders in exchange for Hezbollah and Hamas abductees. He wants a party that would permanently scrap the frenetic idea of future uprooting of settlements, known euphemistically as "convergence." Therefore Gideon Sa'ar, Gilad Erdan, Moshe Kahlon, Reuven Rivlin and Moshe Ya'alon - and other historicLikud loyalists - are at the top of the ticket, while Dan Meridor, with whom Netanyahu intended to "balance" them, was placed near the 20th slot. It is probably not by chance that after the voters elected an ideological team, support for Likud grew. Now even potential voters of Avigdor Lieberman and Shas - and perhaps of Habayit Hayehudi as well - see Likud as a reliable political home. If Netanyahu were a leader whose acts were governed by a solid viewpoint and a long-range strategic vision, rather than by an uncontrollable need to constantly defend himself from his rivals in politics and the media, he should have said that the primary results reflect his voters' will, even if the media didn't like it. He is not saying that because he did not know - and still refuses to know - that the increasing support for Likud in the past months does not stem from the addition of Uzi Dayan and Assaf Hefetz, and not even from Meridor's balanced and reliable image. No. It stems from the public's disillusionment with the nonsense that the Oslo alchemists and Gush Katif uprooters have stuffed down its throat. This - and not Feiglin's people's support - is why the leading candidates received the slots they did. The public has sobered up, the polls show. It is abandoning the deceivers from Kadima and Labor and transferring its support to Likud and even to parties further to the right. What bug, then, has stung Netanyahu to make him behave so recklessly and capriciously even after the polls, which he is so addicted to, tell him what his voters expect? Likud does not need to obfuscate the issues vis-?-vis security and the peace process, as Netanyahu is doing, or to "centralize" its positions, as his "strategic" advisers are telling him to do. He must lead the political map in the right direction and create a new "center." To achieve this he must change the awareness that led to the defeat in the Lebanon war, the ongoing helplessness in view of the bloody terror war - on Tuesday it was 21 years since the intifada erupted - that undermines Israelis' self-confidence and erodes Israel's status in the world. This erosion - which derives from a loss of deterrent power - is becoming a strategic danger, as any reasonable person can see. Also, no enemy would sign a peace treaty with us as long as he detects imminent, chronic weakness on our side. This is reflected by the impotence of this government, which has failed to protect our people and rid them of the endless nightmare of Qassams and kidnappings. Netanyahu is right in asserting that Likud is not Feiglin and does not depend on him. But this is exactly the case with Netanyahu. He is Likud's leader but one may reasonably assume that without him - and with Ya'alon and Sa'ar, Benny Begin and Reuven Rivlin - the number of expected Knesset seats would not decrease; perhaps it would even rise. After all, the damage he is causing these days, and is bound to cause in the coming days with his capricious, imprudent behavior, could keep Likud away from power and put it in the opposition for another term. Bookmark to del.icio.us   Off with your seat! Likud committee bumps Feiglin down to 36th on party ticket. Trotting for the Globe Israeli animated feature 'Waltz with Bashir' nominated for Golden Globe award.   1.   Lieberman, not Bibi!! 11:13  |  Yaakov K. 12/12/08   2.   Likud is rising BECAUSE of people like Begin and Feiglin. 19:44  |  Chaim 12/12/08

Read & React Iran irate after Sarkozy rules out shaking Ahmadinejad's hand Responses: 72 Livni: It isn't possible to bring every soldier home Responses: 25 ANALYSIS / IDF soldiers must at least believe they won't be abandoned Responses: 22 Yossi Sarid: We're weakening ourselves before future civil war with settlers Responses: 19 Yoel Marcus: Barak better equipped to deal with Iran, Hamas than Netanyahu Responses: 14 More Headlines 23:47 Palestinians: Israel asked to annex 6.8% of West Bank 20:13 IDF soldiers critically wound Palestinian youth with rubber-coated bullet 23:14 IDF chief of staff: Freeing Gilad Shalit is always on the agenda 23:45 Jimmy Carter: I would have been delighted to meet Hezbollah officials 12:41 State to court: Rescind release of settler who shot Hebron Palestinians 16:15 U.S. Army sends American-Israeli woman to Afghanistan 15:42 50 years on, Holocaust survivor defends Rudolph Kastner 00:13 Egyptian guards shoot dead African man trying to cross into Israel 17:16 Ahmadinejad: Israel at end of line, will soon fade away 19:59 Wheelchair-bound woman, 50, dies in Jerusalem apartment blaze 13:28 Amira Hass returns to Gaza after a two-year absence 12:13 Palestinian poll: 40 percent of Gaza residents wish to emigrate 12:18 Suspected Muslim extremist shoots and kills Yemen Jew 10:35 Barak: Likud still far-right, despite Feiglin demotion 20:53 Two Qassams hit Negev, days before Gaza cease-fire set to end 09:18 ANALYSIS / IDF soldiers must at least believe they won't be abandoned 18:18 Holocaust comedy is fine, it's kitsch we should worry about Previous Editions Select Day 12 dec 11 dec 10 dec 09 dec 08 dec 07 dec 05 dec 04 dec 03 dec 02 dec 01 dec 30 nov

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