TEL AVIV, Israel, Nov. 8 (UPI) -- Prime Minister Ariel Sharon Monday failed to win the Knesset's approval of Cabinet reshuffle, but shortly before midnight won its backing for a smaller-scale, fallback plan.
He failed in his original bid because eight hawks in his own Likud Knesset faction voted with the opposition against the motion and others stayed away.
That motion called for confirming Acting Finance Minister Ehud Olmert as permanent finance minister. It sought approval also for promoting two prominent Likud Knesset Members, who backed him over the withdrawal from the Gaza Strip and the evacuation of four settlements in the northern West Bank, as full-fledged ministers. He proposed making Deputy Defense Minister Zeev Boim the absorption minister and the Chairman of the Knesset House Committees Ronnie Bar-On, the industry and trade minister.
"These colleagues are personally fitting (to be ministers) but (Sharon) turned them into a symbol of a system that cannot be accepted," a Likud rebel, former Foreign Minister David Levy, said.
The fourth appointment concerned Labor's Minister without Portfolio Matan Vilnay who was to become minister of science, but this was not the issue.
The appointments were presented to the Knesset as a package, and the legislators were to vote for or against the entire proposal.
Half the 120 Knesset members voted against, 54 voted for, and Speaker Reuven Rivlin announced: "The Cabinet request was not accepted."
Sharon nodded briefly, went to the podium, pulled a page of folded paper out of his jacked pocket and read out a statement slamming "Members of the Likud faction... for foiling a move designed to strengthen the Likud and give it the representation it deserved according to coalition agreements.
"I have no complaints to the opposition. It is fulfilling its role, but for those who are still called 'members of the coalition' this move (of rejecting the government's request) will, of course, have consequences."
He did not say what he planned to do to the rebels.
His immediate goal, he said, was to preserve the economy's stability and that requires "a new proposal."
From the Knesset rostrum he called upon the Cabinet members to convene immediately and in a session that was open to the press and lasted only a few minutes won its approval to seek confirmation of Olmert's and Vilnay's positions, only.
Olmert's confirmation was vital because Israeli law limits an acting minister's term of office to three months - and cannot be extended. Olmert took over from Binyamin Netanyahu who resigned in August, the day the government approved the withdrawal from Gaza, and the three months will be up Wednesday.
Knesset members realized a Cabinet cannot function without an active finance minister and some rebels did not want to bring the government down and precipitate early elections. Therefore, even prominent Likud rebels, such as Netanyahu, voted for Olmert when revised motion was brought to the Knesset shortly before midnight and concerned only Olmert and Vilany.
In the second round, 71 Knesset members voted for the Sharon's motion and 41 voted against.
The initial round nevertheless exposed Sharon's weakness and reflected the tough time he might encounter when he seeks Knesset support for potentially tougher decisions such as the budget.
The Likud seemed to emerge as two separate parties and tensions erupted at a closed faction meeting.
Knesset Member Ayub Kara, who strongly opposed the withdrawal, told Ruhama Avraham, who supported Sharon and several months ago became Deputy Interior Minister that her appointment was "the mother of prostitution."
"Let's decide," Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom reportedly said. "You want to continue for a year (until the national elections currently slated for November 7, 2006)? Fine. You don't want? Let's decide to go to (early) elections."
"Every time ... divisions advance the day the Likud might split," Tourism Minister Avraham Hirchson told reporters.
Some political analysts did not expect Sharon to call for early elections over an issue as Boim's and Bar-On's appointments. At the Cabinet meeting Sharon said he still expected to have them approved. He did not say when.
He complained that some members have been putting spokes in the cabinet's wheels for the past year and a half.
A public opinion poll published Friday indicated Sharon would have won national elections had they been held now.
If he would head the Likud and Vice Premier Shimon Peres would head Labor, 42 percent of the people would have voted for Sharon and 21 percent for Peres, the poll showed.
A representative sample of 494 Israelis was asked how they would vote if Sharon would form a new party, Peres would head Labor, and Netanyahu would head the Likud. The answers showed Sharon would have 32 percent of the votes, Netanyahu 20 and Peres 19.
