The Israeli Labor Party's highest internal court is to hear arguments on Thursday from Defense Minister Benjamin Ben Eliezer and Knesset Speaker Avraham Burg over the former's allegations of massive vote fraud in the Druze community in Tuesday's Labor leadership primary, said Haaretz newspaper.
The court also banned the party from announcing the winner of its leadership contest at noon Thursday as planned, after accepting a petition for a stay by the apparent loser, Ben Eliezer.
The court said it had agreed to the stay because of the seriousness of the allegations made by Ben Eliezer.
With the votes from all but one polling station (at which only 145 voters are registered) counted, Burg leads Ben Eliezer by 1,088 votes, or 1.5 percent.
Burg received 50.1 percent of the valid votes to Ben Eliezer's 48.6 percent (there were also some abstentions).
Turnout was higher than expected: 61.2 percent of party members, or 71,508 people, cast a ballot.
After trailing for much of the count Tuesday night, it was the Druze votes that gave Burg the lead, said the paper.
Early Tuesday night, when the ballot counting began, Ben Eliezer was leading Burg by 2-8 percent. Even at the time, Burg supporters assured reporters that the Druze vote would change the picture, and in fact, when the Druze ballots began arriving, at about 1:OOam, Ben Eliezer's lead rapidly evaporated.
Despite the legal battle that Ben Eliezer is waging against the results, the putative winner plans to declare victory at a rally Thursday evening. Burg is also planning his next move - whether or not to join the government - and will announce his decision Thursday, the paper added.
Ben Eliezer's team, however, is confident that they will be able to overturn the results.
On Wednesday, his lawyers were feverishly gathering evidence of Druze vote fraud in Burg's favor.
Labor Party members were voting to replace Ehud Barak, who resigned following his crushing defeat by Prime Minister Ariel Sharon in February 6 elections, and determine who will run for the premiership in 2003 – Albawaba.com
© 2001 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
