Jan 6 1999 Former Chief of Staff Amnon Lipkin-Shahak announced today he was running for the premiership in the Israeli elections set for May 17, the 22nd anniversary of the great "Mahapach" of 1977, when 29 years of Labor rule came to an end, replaced by what has now been 22 years of Likud rule (except for four years of shared rule in national unity governments in the 1980s, and the 2.5 years that the Rabin/Peres government served in the mid-90s).

Shahak said he wasn't left or right, not Likud or Labor, but the center. His attack on Netanyahu was impressive, saying outright what has been known to the security establishment since 1996, that Netanyahu is dangerous. But his solutions are warmed over rephrasings of the need for compromise, and while he convincingly describes the need for change, he makes compromise the goal of his platform, instead of offering up suggestions for where compromise can be made.

Yet, he has a generous face, and generosity of spirit is probably the single sorest missing commodity right now in Israel.

Beating Shahak to the punch in the grab for the center was former Likud minister Dan Meridor, who put up posters yesterday with his no-longer boyish, but not very inspiring sad sack eyes, saying he was the center. He, too, says he's in favor of compromise. A month ago, putting their names together on a list was like a one-two punch against Netanyahu and Barak. Now they haven't figured out how to compromise with each other -- and meanwhile, the polls are beginning to tell a new story.

As of last weekend, the polls said that Barak, Shahak and Meridor could all beat Netanyahu. In a runoff amongst all four, not counting Benny Begin, who is flanking Netanyahu on the right, Barak still comes out ahead and when Begin's name is added, Netanyahu falls to within a couple of percent from Shahak and Meridor.

Shahak said Barak could be a good prime minister, but that Barak's chosen "the way of the Labor Party," which Shahak says is not capable of winning the election. There's no doubt that Shahak would be part of a Barak coalition. There is a little doubt about Meridor, because without Shahak on board, Meridor will be dragged rightward even as he tries to explain that compromise, which like Shahak, he's going to be selling in order to win the center, also includes making compromises with the Arabs.

Netanyahu, meanwhile, has good reason to worry that after the Likud primaries in February, there could be a putsch against him from within the Likud, which is now a party of opportunists, corrupted by so many years in power that few of its members know the words to the Betar anthem, but most of them believe the old Betar slogan (from their years in opposition) that God chose them to rule. Arik Sharon and Ehud Olmert say they have nothing to do with the conspiracy, and Uzi Landau, the last prince, not counting Geula Cohen's son Tzachi, is an above the board type of fellow, so he won't get involved with a putsch until after he loses to Netanyahu in the primaries.

Among the religious, the situation is much easier to understand, but the prognosis for them is not so clear. Under the Likud they prospered from the state -- whether it was the settlement movement of the NRP and Bnei Akiva, or the yeshiva movement of the Aguda and Shas. Shas' unique focus on providing social services (and torah) to the poor, not unlike Hamas' efforts in Gaza and the West Bank, also relied heavily on state funding.

Their masses may not know it, but the rabbis certainly do, that never in Jewish history have so many Jews been studying in yeshivas instead of working and studying in their spare time (unless they were superior students, selected to study or lucky enough to marry a wealthy man's daughter). The Spanish Empire, it's said, began collapsing when the state was funding a third of the work force to be clerics in the Church that also eradicated its intellectual, merchant, and professional classes, when it expelled the Jews and Muslims.

Israel hasn't reached that stage yet, but there's no doubt that anti-clericalism is part of the appeal of the center.

How will the Israeli public vote? It's impossible to predict. Logically, they should go 70 percent for Labor and the center, 25 percent to the nationalist/religious and 5 percent to the oddballs, because as soon as you divorce party identification from the issues, that's how people are divided. But as Netanyahu's Finkelstein and Barak's Carville both know, in an election campaign, emotions, not reason, are what swing the voter. Trouble is, when it comes to emotions, there's a lot more hatred here nowadays than there is love.