Jerusalem - Just when the re-election campaign of the Israeli Prime Minister, Mr Benjamin Netanyahu, seemed to be stalling, the Israeli opposition has contrived to revive it for him, David Horovitz reports.
Derisive and ill-considered remarks by an actress, Ms Tiki Dayan, at a rally attended by Mr Netanyahu's main rival, Mr Ehud Barak, have galvanized the prime minister and his supporters, ahead of the May 17th general elections.
Ms Dayan derided Israelis who back Mr Netanyahu and his hardline Likud party as "a nation apart . . . people from the market-place, riff-raff." They were so dumb, she went on, that they'd vote for the Likud even if it were headed by Mr Yasser Arafat.
Desperate to prevent the outcry costing him votes among the working-class Sephardi Jews (those of Middle Eastern and North African origin) he has been trying to woo away from Mr Netanyahu, Mr Barak condemned the comments and obtained an apology from Ms Dayan.
Mr Netanyahu, sensing the chance to reverse his poor showing in the polls - he is some 8 per cent behind Mr Barak - was not to be mollified. "I'm proud to be riff-raff," he shouted to cheers during a walkabout in a Tel Aviv market yesterday.