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Right-wing Candidate Elected as Israel's New President
Israel's right-wing presidential candidate Moshe Katsav was elected the eighth president of the State of Israel in a special parliament session Monday morning.
The dramatic victory of Katsav has been viewed as a coup as his opponent, the ruling One Israel's candidate Shimon Peres, was widely regarded before the secret ballot as the leading candidate who reportedly had guaranteed 60 votes in the 120-member Knesset or parliament.
Katsav is expected to be sworn in on Tuesday morning to serve a seven-year term as Israel's head of state.
During the election campaign, Katsav repeatedly promoted his slogan that Israel, at this stage, needs a more central president than Peres for the purpose of uniting the nation in light of a widening rift between the left and the right, the secular and the religious in the country.
Peres, who won a Nobel Peace Prize in 1994 for his efforts to masterplan the landmark Oslo Accords between Israel and the Palestinians, is regarded as the most dovish politician in the Jewish state.
In this context, the election of Katsav, who is from the right-wing Likud faction which opposes Prime Minister Ehud Barak's efforts to push forward the peace process with Arab countries, is expected to do harm to Barak's peace tasks, some analysts predicted.
However, the Israeli president, who represents the country abroad and at home as the head of state, grants pardons, receives diplomatic credentials, swears in judges and signs laws, is a highly ceremonial post.
Katsav also repeated on many occasions during the campaign that he will not be too political and meddle in the government's affairs if he is elected.
The blow dealt to Barak due to Peres's defeat, thus, might be only at the psychological and morale level, some analysts argued.
Born in Iran in 1945, Katsav immigrated to the newborn Israel with his parents in 1951. The eldest of eight children in an Orthodox religious family, he grew up in a transit tent camp for new immigrants and later in the development town of Kiryat Malachi.
He graduated from the Ben-Shemen Agricultural School. After serving military service as corporal in the Communications Corps, he received a degree in Economics and History from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
In the university, he already began his political life as chairman of the Gahal Party (Likud's predecessor) student organization. Later, he served as president of the Young B'nai Brith organization in his hometown of Kiryat Malachi and wrote for Israel's leading Yediot Aharonot daily.
In 1969, he was elected Mayor of Kiryat Malachi as a 24-year-old student, then youngest mayor in Israel. He later was re-elected as Kiryat Malachi Mayor in 1974 and kept his post until 1981.
In 1977, he began his parliament career as a member of the Knesset Committee on Interior Affairs and the Environment, and the Committee on Education and Culture.
He also served as chairman of the Knesset Members' Lobby for Development Towns. He was Likud parliamentary faction chairman in the 13th Knesset (1992-1996).
In 1981, he joined in the Menachem Begin and later Yitzhak Shamir government as Deputy Housing and Construction Minister.
He later served as Labor and Social Affairs Minister from 1984 to 1988, and Minister of Transport from 1988 to 1992.
After Likud's Benjamin Netanyahu won the 1996 general elections against the then acting Prime Minister Peres, Katsav was appointed Deputy Prime Minister and Tourism Minster. He also served as minister in charge of Israeli Arab affairs.
He was head of the Israel-China Parliamentary Friendship League and visited China in 1995 as head of an Israeli parliamentary delegation, the first such delegation since Israel and China established diplomatic relations in 1992.
Katsav has five children.
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