Almost a week after declaring his wish to run for president of Israel, 22% of the public supports the candidacy of 2011 Nobel Prize Laureate in Chemistry Prof. Dan Shechtman for the job, according to a survey by the Rafi Smith Institute. The poll also found that 19% of the public supports MK Reuven Rivlin (Likud) for the job, 8% support MK Binyamin (Fouad) Ben-Eliezer (Labor), and 8% support Minister of National Infrastructures Silvan Shalom. 4% of the respondents support Natan Sharansky, and 3% support former Labor Party MK Dalia Itzik.
Although Shechtman has the strongest public support, the Knesset plenum, not the public, elects the president in a secret ballot. Shechtman will find it hard to garner support in the Knesset.
Belying previous assessments that public support would sway the legislature, it seems that a Nobel Prize Laureate will not receive the support of the 19 MKs of Minister of Finance Yair Lapid's Yesh Atid. Shechtman presumably will not have the support of the Likud either, after he called for the replacement of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu from the Technion podium in January 2013.
Sources inform ''Globes'' that Yisrael Beitenu chairman Minister of Foreign Affairs Avigdor Liberman has promised Netanyahu the he will support whichever candidate Netanyahu nominates for the presidency.
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on January 23, 2014
© Copyright of Globes Publisher Itonut (1983) Ltd. 2014