Reporting from Jerusalem — Jerusalem's voters Tuesday ended five years of ultra-Orthodox rabbinical leadership at City Hall, choosing as mayor a secular businessman who has promised to reverse the city's slide into poverty and the exodus of its Jewish population.
Israel Radio said near-complete returns gave self-made millionaire Nir Barkat an unbeatable lead over Rabbi Meir Porush and two other candidates. Porush conceded defeat after an unofficial count from 600 of the 707 polling stations gave him 38% of the vote, compared with Barkat's 51%.
Russian-born tycoon Arkady Gaydamak won 7%, according to unofficial results. Dan Biron, a bar owner with a shoestring campaign budget, finished last with less than 1%. The winner needed at least 40% of the vote to avoid a runoff.
The election was part of a fierce struggle between secular and religious forces over Jerusalem's Jewish identity. Most Arabs, who make up about one-third of the city's population of 760,000, boycotted the exercise to protest Israel's claim of sovereignty over the entire city.
Barkat, 49, pledged today in a predawn victory speech to be "the mayor of everyone" -- religious and secular, Arabs and Jews.
"There is room in Jerusalem for everyone," he declared to jubilant supporters at his campaign headquarters. "If there's not room for everyone, then there's not room for anyone."
Ultra-Orthodox Jews, who follow a strict dress code and dedicate themselves to the study of holy texts, make up about one-fifth of the city's population. Their strong turnout in the 2003 election produced an administration led by Mayor Uri Lupolianski; he and four of his five deputy mayors are ultra-Orthodox rabbis.
Their administration alienated secular Jews and many who are modern Orthodox. Those Jews chafed under what they called an imposition of the ruling rabbis' conservative social values and official favoritism toward ultra-Orthodox communities in the funding of schools, synagogues and other facilities.
Barkat, who was soundly beaten in the last election, took a strong opposition role on the city council, faulting the rabbis for what he called a poor climate for business investment and a lack of transparency in public spending.
He mobilized 3,000 young volunteers this time to get more voters to the polls.
A factional split among Hassidic Jews, meanwhile, turned part of the traditionally monolithic ultra-Orthodox community against the 53-year-old Porush, who ran in Lupolianski's stead under a power-sharing pact between their political parties.
