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Lapid: The surprise ticket
By CNN's Chief International Correspondent Christiane Amanpour
TEL AVIV, Israel (CNN) -- Some say Israel is at war with itself... two Israel's in a battle of ideas and cultures. On the one side are the ultra-Orthodox who want a religious state and whose power is steadily growing, while on the other is the secular Israel, which wants to roll back religious legislation, and advocates a separation of synagogue and state. Yosef Tommy Lapid, 71, wants the secular vote. An unlikely candidate for the youth vote, he has nonetheless pulled off this election's biggest surprise so far. His Shinui party is poised to become the third-largest in Israel, and thus the kingmaker in a coalition government. They call the former journalist, author and TV commentator, a political gadfly. But opinion polls suggest he may triple his party's number of Knesset seats in Tuesday's election and replace the religious party Shas in influence. Lapid said: "I want a secular government, I want separation of state and religion, I think logic will prevail and we will have a secular government for the first time in Israel's history." He would end what amounts to state-subsidized Judaism, by cutting government benefits to the ultra-Orthodox who are exempt from serving in the army and from working. "They don't work, 80% of the men don't work, they don't pay taxes," Lapid said. "Others have to subsidize their existence. I don't think this is possible in a liberal western country." The message has struck a chord: "The religious people are squeezing us, they are absolutely living on our back..." To block their power, Lapid refuses to join a coalition government with the ultra-Orthodox -- and they want nothing to do with him either: One ultra-Orthodox voter said: "We are not suited to sit with a racist like Tommy Lapid who hates Orthodox Jews more than he hates Arabs." Lapid is often portrayed as a bigot. He admits he looks the part of U.S. television character Archie Bunker, but says he's popular because Israelis are fed up with discrimination over who's a real Jew. He also says they are disillusioned with scandal, economic malaise and the violent stalemate with the Palestinians. So does he have a peace plan? "Oh yes, very much so," he says. "I think we will be the bridge between the right and left." Lapid says only national consensus in Israel can lead to peace with the Palestinians in which he would dismantle many settlements and annex those along the border, recognize a Palestinian state and give them autonomy over their parts of Jerusalem. In Israel, commentators wonder whether weary voters are looking at Shinui, which means Change, the same way U.S. voters looked at Ross Perot's Reform Party... as a protest vote that will crumble after the election. Lapid scoffs at the very notion. "Ross Perot was a rich joke," Lapid says. "I am a very poor man but serious. We are in serious business."
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