Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak faced a new test in parliament on Monday, with the 120-member assembly due to vote on five motions of no confidence in his crippled minority government.
Parliamentary spokesman Giora Pordes said Israeli Arab political parties had lodged four censure motions to protest at the deaths of Israeli Arabs early last month during demonstrations in support of the Palestinian Intifada or uprising.
Another no-confidence motion has been lodged by the staunchly secular Shinui party over Barak's decision to shelve plans for a so-called "secular revolution" in return for the support of the ultra-Orthodox Jewish party Shas.
Barak's government has just 30 seats in parliament but without Shas and its key 17-vote bloc, his opponents are unlikely to muster the necessary support for any moves to topple the government.
After failing in his efforts to forge a national emergency government with the hardline right-wing opposition leader Ariel Sharon, Barak last week won a temporary lifeline from Shas which only three months earlier had bolted the coalition.
Shas led a mass walk-out of right wing and religious parties over Barak's peace policies ahead of the Camp David peace summit in July.
Thirteen Arab Israelis were killed last month when the bloody clashes across the Palestinian territories spilled over in Israel.
Arab Israelis number more than a million, or one sixth of the country's population -- JERUSALEM (AFP)
© 2000 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
