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numbers for an array of smaller, issue-specific parties. The result: though I’d won by a landslide, and One Israel had the largest number of Knesset seats, even with our natural left-of-center ally, Meretz, we would have only 36 Knesset seats – well short of the 61 needed for a majority. Even if we included a few smaller parties, there was no choice but to bring in one of the two larger ones: the Sephardi Orthodox Shas, with 17 seats; or Likud, which, after Bibi’s sudden resignation, was now led by Arik Sharon, and had 19.

It wasn’t just a math problem. It had a critical policy implication. If I wanted to tackle the domestic challenge – to reassert the values of secular-led democratic government over increasingly assertive religious involvement in our day-to-day politics – that would mean choosing Likud over Shas. But it would also signal the effective end of the peace process. Even though Arik assured me privately that he understood my determination to reopen peace efforts with Arafat and Hafez al-Assad, I knew Arik. The path toward peace agreements, assuming they were even possible, would be tough. Sooner or later – and certainly if we faced the need to consider painful compromises in the negotiations – I was certain that Arik would act as a kind of opposition from within. That was why, over the angry opposition of Meretz leader Yossi Sarid, I decided to go with the Sephardi Orthodox party. I realized that even Shas might walk out if the scale of any land-for-peace concessions proved too high. But it was the least extreme of the major religious parties on the question of peace with the Palestinians. In my conversations with the party’s spiritual leader and guide, the 79-year-old rabbi and Talmudic scholar Ovadia Yosef, I was struck by his intelligence, erudition and subtletly of thought – but, above all, his commitment to the core Jewish principle of sanctifying human life over the specifics of Oslo redeployments, where his inclination seemed to be to trust the judgment of those with the experience and expertise to evaluate the security implications.

To Meretz’s additional consternation, I included two smaller, right-of-center Orthodox parties in the coalition. It was not just to make good on my pledge to be Prime Minister for all Israelis. Knowing that I was going to put top priority on the peace process, I wanted to avoid an undiluted left-of-centre, secular thrust to the government. When I’d stood in front of the tens of thousands of cheering supporters in Rabin Square after the election, I thought to myself: they think that with Bibi gone, peace is around the corner. I wanted a coalition broad enough to keep Meretz, and Labor ministers as well, from forgetting a crucial fact: the

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