Word: blocs
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...away from moves toward a solution based on the Arab peace plan for which Obama recently expressed support. The terms of that plan call for a two-state solution on the basis of the 1967 borders and sharing Jerusalem. That Palestinian bottom line, however, is explicitly rejected by the bloc of parties now with a majority in Israel's parliament. And the consensus on the Palestinian side is moving toward a Fatah-Hamas unity government...
...former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu by a narrow margin (29 seats to 28), but Netanyahu may have good reason to count himself the victor. That's because Tuesday's vote confirmed a sharp swing to the right by Israel's electorate, with exit polls giving a combined right-wing bloc led by Netanyahu gaining 64 of the 120 seats in the Knesset, compared with only 56 for center-left bloc led by Livni. Late last year, Livni failed to form a majority coalition when she took over her party from disgraced Prime Minister Ehud Olmert - a failure that triggered Tuesday...
Indeed, al-Sadr's once formidable movement appears to be at its nadir, with the cleric himself scarcely a presence in Iraqi politics these days and his political bloc pushed to the sidelines of the provincial elections on Jan. 31. A series of military defeats at the hands of toughened Iraqi security forces plus political missteps over the past year by al-Sadr and his followers have left the future of the mass movement in doubt. And without a solid showing of popular support in the coming vote, the Sadrists appear set to lose what remains of the enormous political...
...only known as "the Right Rev. New Dealer," but he was also the most effective critic of Father Charles Coughlin, the notorious right-wing, anti-Roosevelt priest. Ryan's participation in the Inauguration helped insulate Roosevelt against Coughlin's attacks and shore up the growing - and critical - voting bloc of Catholic Democrats...
...start, the main Shi'ite and Sunni political blocs are crumbling. In three weeks of infighting over the resignation of the speaker of parliament and the task of appointing his replacement, the Sunni Tawafiq bloc has shrunk to just over half its original size of 44 MPs. In the past three years, parliament has also seen the ruling Shi'ite bloc slowly split apart. The most significant blow came in 2007 with the angry departure of dozens of followers of anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. And the bloc's remaining big powers - al-Maliki's Dawa Islamic Party...