- Title: Outsider Gabbai wins Israeli Labour Party leadership contest
- Date: 10th July 2017
- Summary: ****WARNING CONTAINS FLASH PHOTOGRAPHY*** VARIOUS CELEBRATIONS
- Embargoed: 24th July 2017 23:03
- Keywords: Israel Labour Party leadrship vote Avi Gabbai victory speech
- Location: JERUSALEM/ SDEROT AND TEL AVIV, ISRAEL
- City: JERUSALEM/ SDEROT AND TEL AVIV, ISRAEL
- Country: Israel
- Topics: Government/Politics,Elections/Voting
- Reuters ID: LVA0036P4V4G7
- Aspect Ratio: 16:9
- Story Text: Outsider Avi Gabbai was elected chairman of Israel's opposition Labour party on Monday (July 10) by beating veteran Amir Peretz, a former defence minister and labour union chief, in a leadership runoff.
Gabbai, 50, a relative newcomer to Israeli politics, last year defected to centre-left Labour from the centre-right Kulanu party, which is part of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's right-wing coalition government.
Labour and a smaller party headed by Tzipi Livni, a past foreign minister, have formed the Zionist Union, the largest opposition faction in the 120-seat Knesset with 24 seats.
Although not a lawmaker, Gabbai served as environment minister in Netanyahu's government. He quit in 2016 in protest at the sacking of defence minister Moshe Yaalon to make way for Avigdor Lieberman from a rightist coalition partner.
Jerusalem-born Gabbai, the son of immigrants from Morocco, garnered 52.4 percent of the Labour membership vote. He does not have a seat in the current parliament and so in his victory speech he asked Isaac Herzog to stay on as opposition leader for the time being. - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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