JERUSALEM -- In a stunning defeat for the country's hard-liners, Israelis overwhelmingly elected Ehud Barak, retired army chief of staff, as prime minister yesterday, sweeping from office Benjamin Netanyahu and eroding his Likud coalition's representation in Israel's parliament.
Netanyahu conceded defeat within a half-hour of the closing of the polls, even though it was only television exit polls that declared Barak the winner.
Those polls gave Barak, a political moderate and leader of the opposition Labor Party, at least 57 percent of the votes, compared with 43 percent for Netanyahu, a tally that seemed to reflect the actual vote as unofficial figures were released.
"I want to congratulate Ehud Barak on his victory in the elections," said Netanyahu, who announced his decision to step down as Likud leader.
"The nation decided, and we respect that decision; that is the way it is in a democracy."
Tens of thousands of Israelis jammed the Tel Aviv square named for Barak's mentor, Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, who was assassinated by a religious Jew for implementing the Oslo peace accords.
Barak, the soldier-turned-politician, arrived there at 3:30 in the morning to thank his supporters.
"This place is the dawn of a new day," he told the cheering crowds. "You didn't give up for one moment.
"I will be proud to be your prime minister and the prime minister of everybody. ... This victory belongs to the entire people of Israel."
But within hours of his win, Katyusha rockets rained down on northern Israel from Lebanon. Barak reiterated his pledge to extricate Israel from its security zone in southern Lebanon.
The latest border incident seemed a clear message from Hezbollah guerrillas that the problem was unresolved.
The 57-year-old Barak, Israel's most decorated war veteran, campaigned on a message of hope and change for an Israel divided over the stalled peace process, the growing rift between religious and secular Jews, and a depressed economy.
He pledged to resume the peace process with the Palestinians and to reverse the intransigence that characterized Netanyahu's stall of the 1994 Oslo accords.
But he is an ardent hawk on the toughest issues that remain to be decided in the peace process: the nature of a Palestinian state, the future of Jerusalem and the fate of the Jewish settlements in the occupied territories of the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
The Clinton administration, long frustrated by Netayahu's tactics of delay in the peace process, invited Barak to the White House as soon as he could come.
Palestinians applaud
Palestinian leaders welcomed Netanyahu's defeat as a sign of Israelis' desire for peace.
"We hope that the dry three years under Netanyahu would be forgotten and hope would return by pursuing peace," said Ahmed Qurei, the president of the Palestinian Legislative Council and a chief negotiator in the original 1993 Oslo talks.
Uri Dromi, a former government spokesman in the Labor-led government of Shimon Peres and Rabin, characterized yesterday's vote as a backlash against Netanyahu and the right-wing bloc in his government.
"You can't stay prime minister for long if you rely on extremists," said Dromi.
Before he can restart the peace process and mend the cultural and ethnic rifts in Israeli society, Barak has 45 days to form a new government.
In electing a new parliament yesterday, Israel's 4.2 million voters increased the representation of the moderate, centrist parties that advocate a decrease in the influence of ultra-religious Jews on Israelis' daily lives.
Changes in legislature
But they further split Israel's already fractured legislature: 17 parties will be represented in the 120-member parliament, compared with 11 now represented.
Netanyahu's Likud party took one of the biggest hits, losing possibly 14 of its 32 seats.
Shas, the powerful party of ultra-Orthodox Jews from Arab countries, scored the biggest victory, increasing its likely membership from 10 to 17. Shas would be the third-largest party in the 120-member Knesset.
Israel B'Aliya, the Russian immigrant party of former Soviet dissident Natan Sharansky, looked likely to lose two of its seven Knesset seats. A new Russian party, led by a Netanyahu ally, won two seats, according to the early forecasts.
Dromi, an analyst with the Israel Democracy Institute, characterized Barak as a "cautious" and "cool-headed" thinker who "can make the right decisions." But he will have to "learn to work with people whose political opinions differ from his," Dromi said.
"Rabin tried to push through a peace agreement with a small minority," added Emmanuel Gutman, an expert on the Israel government at Hebrew University.
"If Barak wants to make a peace agreement with the Palestinians work, he will have to widen his government. I think this is very possible on the basis of these results."
Netanyahu, who won a narrow upset victory in 1996 in the aftermath of terrorist attacks in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, was forced to face an early election when he lost support among his fractious coalition government in December.
Veteran Likud members, including some of the party's brightest, quit Netanyahu's government. Other, more right-wing coalition members abandoned Netanyahu because he signed the Wye Peace Agreement with the Palestinians -- a land-for-security deal the prime minister marginally carried out and then halted because of what he called Palestinian noncompliance.
Netanyahu previously forestalled votes to tumble his government, relying on the fears of hard-liners that new elections would enable the dovish Labor party to return to power and resume the peace process that includes giving up land captured from the Arabs. Those fears are being realized now.
Two Likud ministers who quit Netanyahu's government, Yitzhak Mordechai and Dan Meridor, formed a new Center party to try to defeat Netanyahu. Sunday, Mordechai dropped out of the race for prime minister. He and Meridor asked supporters to vote for Barak.
Divisive campaign
The spring election campaign was among the most divisive in Israel's 51-year history. Netanyahu, who opposed the Oslo accords when he was the opposition leader, grudgingly agreed to carry them out, but in his fashion and in his own time.
His "peace with security" platform brought the process to a crawl, the most significant land return being the West Bank city of Hebron -- considered holy to both Jews and Arabs.
Netanyahu also transferred additional West Bank land to the Palestinians and won greater security cooperation from Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat. Terror attacks subsided during his three years in office.
But Jewish settlements on the West Bank expanded, new housing developments began in disputed areas of East Jerusalem and the influence of ultra-Orthodox Jewish parties grew.
Relations with the Palestinians and the Arab world deteriorated. The United States, Israel's longtime moral and financial ally, became increasingly frustrated with Netanyahu and his hard-line policies. And the Israeli economy took a nose dive.
Netanyahu's efforts to appease his right-wing coalition partners didn't keep them from turning on him. They fueled growing public opposition to his rule.
Issue of security
During the campaign, Netanyahu hammered away at security as if it were the only issue of concern to voters. He accused Barak and the left of putting their political ambitions ahead of Israel's security. Netanyahu accused Barak and the Labor party of aligning themselves with Arafat and the enemies of the Israeli people.
Netanyahu appealed to his core constituencies of nationalists, religious settlers, ultra-Orthodox Jews and Russian immigrants to secure his re-election.
Barak, in contrast, pursued a message of unity and hope. He joined forces with a well-known former Likud politician of Moroccan descent and moderate religious Jews and campaigned under the banner of One Israel. Barak emphasized his military experience and spoke of the need to get the peace process back on track.
He outlined his four security limits: Jerusalem remains Israel's undivided capital; the majority of the Jewish settlers -- if not the settlements -- would be concentrated in blocs under Israel's control; no return to the 1967 borders, when the West Bank was under the control of Jordan; no foreign or Palestinian army west of the Jordan.
Barak also pledged to have a national referendum on the final status agreement and any deal he brokers with Syria to end Israel's occupation of southern Lebanon in exchange for a return of the disputed Golan Heights.
He also focused on the social and economic ills of the nation. His popularity in the pre-Election Day polls steadily rose.
At the start of the campaign, five candidates were vying for the prime minister's job. On the eve of the election, three had dropped out, leaving Netanyahu and Barak in a head-to-head contest.
'We stood tough'
Ariel Sharon, Israel's foreign minister and one of Netanyahu's strongest allies, addressed the prime minister's supporters at the Likud headquarters.
"We stood tough in a difficult struggle. Ladies and gentlemen, let's look forward. With shouts we can't solve anything. We fought for our path and our path is the right way for the future of Israel."
At a Jerusalem party last night, where revelers celebrated the new prime minister's victory, Edna Ullmann-Margalit echoed the sentiments of many Barak supporters.
"Three years of nightmare are over. Now we'll just have occasional bad dreams," said the Hebrew University philosophy professor. "A framework of normal politics and sane politics has been re-established. There's a strong feeling that today a government without the religious parties is possible. It's a victory for secular Israel."
Reporter Jessica A. Lazar contributed to this article.
Israeli parliament seats
Israel's Central Elections Committee showed this likely distribution of seats in the 120-member parliament, based on unofficial returns from 99.9 percent of polling stations. (Previous Knesset strength in brackets unless new party.)
One Israel (Labor + Allies) 27 (34)
Likud 19 (32)
Shas 17 (10)
Meretz 9 (9)
Yisrael Ba-aliya 7 (7)
The Center Party 6 (-)
Shinui 6 (-)
National Religious Party 5 (9)
United Torah Judaism 5 (4)
United Arab List 5 (Democratic Arab Party 4)
National Union 3 (Moledet 2)
Israel Beiteinu 4 (-)
Hadash (Democratic Front For Peace And Equality) 3 (5)
Am Ehad 3 (-)
Balad (National Democratic Alliance) 2 (-)
SOURCE: Wire services Pub Date: 05/18/99