Ehud Barak, who became the new head of Israel's Labor Party Tuesday, is a passionate watchmaker. He knows all about making damaged chronometers tick again. The man is fond of closed systems that don't depend on communication with the outside world.

The former soldier, who used to be commander of an elite unit and has a record collection of bravery medals, is a sprinter, not a long-distance runner. He prefers doing things himself to working in a team. He's a reckless character, not a ditherer. Now he's waiting for a phone call from Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, who is to appoint him minister of defense following his return from the United States.

Olmert doesn't just need Barak in order to maintain the country's governing coalition. Barak's reputation as an experienced and courageous military officer is also intended to improve the image of Olmert's government. The future defense minister is to restore Israel's capacity to deter its enemies, a capacity that suffered severely during last year's war in Lebanon.

But Olmert will have to be careful around the new leader of the Labor Party -- because, sooner or later, Barak wants to move back into the prime minister's office, which he already occupied between 1999 and 2001. Prior to his nomination as party leader, he promised Olmert no more than temporary cooperation. Barak threatened that, under his leadership, the Labor Party will bring down Israel's current government, because that government failed so miserably during the conflict in Lebanon.

Two Enemies

But that was all yesterday. Barak didn't refer to the Winograd Commission once in his victory speech. The commission is to present its final report on Israel's military and political mistakes during the Lebanon war, indicating possible improvements for future conflicts. Barak's threat that his party will withdraw from the government following the publication of the report seems forgotten.

Barak is conscientiously avoiding threatening Olmert with a withdrawal of the Labor Party from the governing coalition, just as he is avoiding a call for new elections. Barak wants to decide himself when the right time has come -- probably next year, observers in Jerusalem predict.

When that happens, Barak will probably face two enemies. Defeating Olmert, the unpopular prime minister, should not prove too difficult. But defeating Benjamin Netanyahu, the populist opposition leader, could be a challenge -- all the more so as Barak's record of political achievements is modest.

He was successful as prime minister only once, when he behaved like a general: In the spring of 2000, he ordered Israeli troops to retreat from southern Lebanon -- without negotiations and without any attempts at diplomacy.

The Failure of Camp David

His foreign policy initiatives, on the other hand, led nowhere. The peace negotiations with Syria had to be discontinued without producing any result. The attempt to solve the conflict with the Palestinians once and for all at Camp David failed miserably. Barak blamed then Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, accusing him of having revealed his "true face" by rejecting Barak's "enormous concessions."

But essentially, Barak's failure as the Israeli negotiator was also due to his own stubbornness. Barak's coalition government fell apart. He had not been able to secure majority support for his plans in parliament. When he traveled to Camp David, he was backed neither by an Israeli consensus nor by his own government. Barak was representing no one but himself when he tried to solve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict with Yasser Arafat -- and still he tried.

From a Kibbutz to the Alrov Tower

And it wasn't too long before he had to foot the bill: Barak's government lost power, and new elections were held. He didn't stand a chance against then opposition leader Ariel Sharon: Only a third of Israel's citizens voted for Barak in the ballot.

His political career seemed to have ended for certain. "He'll never be back," commentators in the Israeli media claimed. Just two years ago, when the Labor Party elected a new leader, he abstained from running for the position because he didn't believe he had any chance of victory.

Following his 2001 setback, the former prime minister withdrew sulkily into a private existence. Instead of fighting for his ideas on the opposition bench back home, he extended his radius of action abroad. The Harry Walker Agency, which represents prominent public speakers such as Bill Clinton, Al Gore and Bono, organized lucrative appearances for the former prime minister all over the world. He received tens of thousands of dollars for each lecture.