ISRAEL: After opinion polls at the end of last week showed that the scandal-ridden Likud party of the Israeli Prime Minister was sliding dramatically in the polls - to the extent some were beginning to question whether Mr Ariel Sharon would win re-election on January 28th - surveys yesterday indicated that Likud had rebounded and that the opposition Labor Party was the one losing ground.
Violence continued in the Gaza Strip, meanwhile, where Israeli troops shot dead two Palestinians who attacked a bus carrying Jewish settlers.
The centre-right Likud plummeted to projections of 27-28 seats in polls last week, following newspaper revelations that the Israeli Attorney General had asked South Africa for assistance in investigating a $1.5 million loan made by a British businessman living in South Africa, Mr Cyril Kern, to Mr Sharon's sons, allegedly to help in the payback of illegal funding in Mr Sharon's successful bid for the Likud leadership in September 1999.
Yesterday's polls however showed that the trend had been reversed, with a survey in the daily Yediot Ahronot giving the Likud 32-33 seats, and a poll in the Ma'ariv daily showing the ruling party with 32 seats (in the 120-seat parliament). Both polls showed the struggling Labor Party slipping back from 22 to 20 seats.
Some attributed Mr Sharon's rapid rebound to a decision last week by Supreme Court Justice Mishael Cheshin, who chairs an electoral parliamentary committee, to pull the plug on the live television and radio broadcast of a press conference called by the Prime Minister to respond to the loan affair allegations.
In an unprecedented move, Mr Cheshin ordered the broadcast terminated, saying Mr Sharon had violated a law forbidding "election propaganda" in the month before the vote when he launched into a tirade against the Labor Party at the outset of his press conference.
The move appears to have incensed some wavering Likud supporters, who rallied around the prime minister, viewing the judge's decision as an attempt to silence Mr Sharon and not allow him to respond to the allegations against him.
Many Likud voters come from the ranks of the working class and some commentators suggested that the sight of a judge, considered a member of the country's old established elite, blacking out Mr Sharon's press conference, had shunted them back into the Likud camp.
In an attempt to counter its dip in the polls, Labor said yesterday it planned to announce it would not join a Sharon-led government under any circumstances. This move is viewed as an attempt to undermine Mr Sharon's pledge to re-establish a national unity government with Labour if he is re-elected, which has been an effective card with centrist voters.
In Gaza, troops shot dead two Palestinians who approached a bus carrying settlers near the settlement of Netzarim.
The army said that soldiers shot the two men, who they said were armed, as they moved toward the bus.