Livni seeks unity after contentious Israeli vote

By Joseph Nasr

TEL AVIV (Reuters) - Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni appealed to her party's restive parliamentary bloc for unity on Friday after she narrowly won an internal ballot to replace scandal-plagued Prime Minister Ehud Olmert.

"We need to act quickly ... We don't have time to waste bickering over politics," she told fellow lawmakers at Kadima party headquarters in Tel Aviv, their first meeting since she beat former general Shaul Mofaz in the voting on Wednesday.

Speed was vital, she said, "because there are difficult challenges facing us as a nation and Kadima is the party running the country and will go on doing so for many years".

Mofaz, however, stayed away, after a sometimes bitter campaign that ended with him losing to Livni by a mere 400-odd votes, or just 1 percentage point. During a tense and lengthy count, some Mofaz aides complained of irregularities.

Livni urged the party to pull together now: "Kadima needs to stay united and I'm sorry Shaul Mofaz has decided not to be with us here today."

But her narrow victory has opened a rift within the three-year-old centrist party that could make it harder for her to cobble together a new coalition government and become prime minister once Olmert fulfils his pledge to resign as premier following an investigation into alleged corruption.

Mofaz shocked Israel's political establishment by announcing he was taking a "time out" from politics. The Kadima primary was seen by some as adding pressure along Israel's main ethnic faultline -- between the long-dominant Ashkenazi Jews of European origin, like Livni, and Middle Eastern Sephardis.

Mofaz, who was born in Iran, had inspired hopes among fellow Sephardi Jews that he might become the first of their community ever to become prime minister of a country where many complain they have been treated as second-class citizens.

Livni supporters played down Kadima's divisions, saying most of Mofaz's camp took part in the meeting in a sign of unity.

COALITION TALKS

Livni, a 50-year-old lawyer who once served in the Mossad intelligence agency, began meeting with coalition partners on Thursday, hours after the vote. But insiders questioned her ability to quickly form a new government and become Israel's first female leader since Golda Meir in the 1970s.

Olmert, who faces possible indictment, will notify the cabinet on Sunday of his resignation.

Olmert will then have to present his resignation to President Shimon Peres after Peres returns from abroad at the end of September.

Until Livni forms a government, Olmert plans to stay on as caretaker prime minister and pursue U.S.-sponsored peace talks with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

On Friday, Abbas called to offer congratulations to Livni, who has been Israel's chief peace negotiator, her office said.