The Final Lap

Polls show Peres leading

Never was the contrast in the styles of the two men so apparent. Animated, aggressive, sarcastic, Shimon Peres assailed his opponent, all the while calling him "Mr. Shamir" instead of by his official title of Prime Minister. "You have learned to make mistakes," Peres summed up. "We have learned from your mistakes." Yitzhak Shamir did his best to ignore the barbs. Serious, diffident, somewhat plodding, he pledged to tackle the nation's woes more aggressively. Said he: "Elections come and go, but the country stands forever... We must fortify it."

That half-hour televised debate last week marked the first and probably last time the two candidates will meet before next Monday's parliamentary elections. With questions supplied in advance, the encounter mirrored the sluggish campaign. Opinion also seems becalmed: according to polls published in the Jerusalem Post last week, Peres and his Labor party still enjoy a cozy lead over Shamir's Likud bloc, 39.5% to 29.5%. If that gap holds, Labor could win 47 of the Knesset's 120 seats, vs. 35 for Likud.

To improve his chances, Shamir has cast about for a headline-grabbing diplomatic strike. At one point his aides whispered about a summit meeting with Morocco's King Hassan II or a get-together with Ronald Reagan, but Shamir did not pursue either one. The Prime Minister is still pushing to swap 120 Palestinian guerrillas for three Israeli soldiers held by a wing of the Palestine Liberation Organization. What he would most welcome is a last-minute campaign appearance by his predecessor, Menachem Begin, who remains a virtual recluse in his Jerusalem apartment. Likud officials estimate that a TV or radio address by Begin would be worth between two and five extra seats.

Shamir repeated his pledge to invite Labor to join a national unity government if he is elected, but Peres quickly turned aside the offer as an "election ploy." Nonetheless, the winner almost certainly will need the support of several small parties to build a coalition. Shamir could glean bright news from polls that show Tehiya, an ultra-right-wing Likud partner with three Knesset members, picking up six or seven seats. If the election is taper thin, that could be enough to tip the balance in Shamir's favor.

Both parties continued to rely on TV commercials to win voters' hearts, though neither candidate was featured prominently. Instead, Likud and Labor hired well-known comics to carry the message.

In one skit, Labor chastised Likud for seeming to claim that nothing had been accomplished in Israel before Begin came to power in 1977. "Did you hear, the Likud built Masada?" a comedian asked in a reference to the fabled mountain fortress at which Jewish warriors held off the Romans in the 1st century A.D. The Likud gave as good as it got by poking fun at Peres' ambiguous views. Imitating the Labor leader's voice, the jester answered one question, "Yes. No. Yes. No..."

The ugliest ad was aired by the Kach movement, headed by Rabbi Meir Kahane, the Brooklyn native who believes that all Arabs must be expelled from Israel. As an announcer intoned the names of Israelis killed by Arabs in recent months, blood-red drops spilled on the ground. Then the camera cut to Kahane, who said, "Give me the power and I'll take care of them." By "them" Kahane obviously means the Arabs.

After the vituperative campaign of 1981, both parties signed a pact this year that banned rowdy acts, including the throwing of rocks and tomatoes. Aside from several nasty incidents at Labor rallies last week, the accord has held up well. But if tomatoes have not cropped up as projectiles, they have as an issue. To illustrate the ravages of Israel's 400% annual inflation, Labor opened a stall in Haifa at which it sold tomatoes at 1977 prices. One shekel, or less than half a cent, bought two pounds; the going price today is about 100 shekels. Likud officials reacted as if they had been pelted with overripe Big Boys. Shamir's coalition filed a complaint with the police, arguing that Labor was buying votes with cheap produce, but authorities dismissed the protest. It was a measure of just how stimulating the voters found both candidates that the Great Tomato War found its way into the papers. -