Centrist Cause In Israel Seeks New Leader

"What Sharon and Kadima were offering centrist Israeli society was the idea of unilateral withdrawal, posited in the realization that neither occupation or the peace process are real options," said Yossi Klein Halevi, a senior fellow at the Shalem Center, a research institute in Jerusalem that is often hawkish on security issues.

"But unilateralism is the first casualty here," he continued. "Only Sharon had the will and the clout to take the next step with unilateralism, which will be far more traumatic than Gaza with the evacuation of tens of thousands of the most ideological settlers."

Sharon, 77, had created the centrist party just months ago. Now, its once-assured triumph in March elections appears in doubt.

Halevi said Sharon's absence means that Israel "no longer has a coherent governing party," a conclusion echoed by Israeli and Palestinian officials as they tried to make sense of Kadima's future and predict the direction of the country's two traditional movements, the dovish Labor Party and hawkish Likud.

Soon after Sharon announced the creation of Kadima in November, Israeli public opinion surveys showed it winning as many as a third of the seats in the Knesset, Israel's 120-seat parliament. Kadima's popularity came primarily at the expense of Likud, whose new leader, former prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu, has positioned it as the chief opponent of further territorial concessions to the Palestinians.

But a poll conducted Wednesday for Israel Radio, just before the prime minister was rushed to the hospital, indicated that much of Kadima's popularity comes largely from Sharon. The survey found that without Sharon's leadership, Kadima would win 13 Knesset seats, with as many as 36 seats suddenly cast into the undecided column.

The realization prompted some members of Kadima, which drew from both Labor and Likud, to call for swift elections to select the party's candidate list. By the end of the day Thursday, party members appeared to be rallying behind acting Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in hopes of avoiding a divisive party leadership fight.

Haim Ramon, one of three Knesset members who joined Kadima from the Labor Party, urged members to rally behind Olmert, a former Likud member who as vice premier assumed power when Sharon, his close ally, fell ill.

"If we start a struggle about who is first and who is second, Kadima won't make it until March 28," Ramon said in an interview on Israel's Channel 10.

Olmert, a hawkish former mayor of Jerusalem who supported Sharon's Gaza evacuation, is one of three former Likud members mentioned as a possible leader of Kadima.

Although he has long experience in Israeli politics, Olmert's blunt style and shifting political positions over the years have alienated many prospective supporters. Past opinion polls have found that much of the Israeli public does not trust him, but a survey conducted for the newspaper Haaretz and Channel 10 on Thursday showed that Kadima would win 40 seats under his leadership.

Another leading candidate, Justice Minister Tzipi Livni, is highly popular among the Israeli public but has scant experience in national politics. The other figure mentioned as possible party leader is Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz, whose hawkish reputation could reassure Kadima supporters uneasy about the party's security credentials without Sharon.

"I do not expect a movement of Kadima members back to Likud to happen now," said Itzik Regev, a member of the Likud Central Committee and a longtime supporter of Sharon. "First both parties will have internal elections to choose their Knesset candidates, and after that I could see the two parties running together in a joint list."

Researcher Samuel Sockol contributed to this report.