THE PM, AMERICAN-STYLE

By LISA BEYER/JERUSALEM

When a new president comes into office in the U.S., he invariably promises his Cabinet lots of responsibility and respect, but everyone knows the truth--the President will thoroughly dominate the Administration, and he will treat most of his Cabinet Secretaries like slightly dim distant cousins. In Israel matters have always been different. Ministers there control powerful baronies, and they push hard on the Prime Minister, as do party elders and testy coalition partners. Now Benjamin Netanyahu, who announced his Cabinet last week, is trying to break the old traditions, consolidate power in his own hands and become Israel's first American President-style Prime Minister. He is not finding it easy.

The impulse comes naturally to Netanyahu, though. He spent a total of 16 years in the U.S., as a student, management consultant and diplomat. "He lived and breathed American culture and politics," says Zvi Rafiah, a former Israeli diplomat. "From the point of view of governing style, he is an American." Indeed, Netanyahu has borrowed directly from the U.S. system to create two new agencies to advise him in the hope of siphoning off power from the ministries. Even the names are the same as in Washington: the National Security Council and the Council of Economic Advisers (CEA).

When Israelis voted last month, they elected their Prime Minister directly for the first time, and that gives Netanyahu semipresidential standing. Under the old system, the leader of the party that won the most seats in the Knesset was traditionally asked to form a government. In this case, it was Netanyahu, as the winner of the Prime Minister's race, who brought the party to power. Since the victory was his, Netanyahu believed he could largely ignore party chieftains as he dispensed Cabinet posts, choosing experts and individuals loyal to him instead.

It didn't quite work out that way. The new Prime Minister initially snubbed Dan Meridor, a Likud veteran who was the preferred choice of a dump-Netanyahu movement within the party last fall. Under pressure from key Likud members, Netanyahu named Meridor as Finance Minister. Netanyahu also tried to humble Ariel Sharon, the hawkish and outspoken former Defense Minister, offering him the housing ministry. Sharon, expecting something grander, declined. The party closed ranks behind Sharon, and Netanyahu offered him a new and powerful infrastructure ministry. By the end of last week, Sharon was still sulking and hadn't given an answer.

Netanyahu did stick to his first choice on some appointments. Ya'acov Ne'eman, a close personal associate and eminent private lawyer who is a Likud outsider, is his Justice Minister. The new Defense Minister is Yitzhak Mordechai, a retired general and newcomer to government with no known political views, who cleaved to Netanyahu throughout the campaign. Overall, the Cabinet includes both hard-liners, such as Agricultural Minister Rafael Eitan, a former chief of staff, and moderates, including Meridor and Foreign Minister David Levy, who returns to the post he held from 1988 to 1992 in the last Likud government.

If the style of the Netanyahu government has American undertones, so does its substance. Israel's CEA will be headed by Jacob Frenkel, governor of the Bank of Israel. A disciple of free marketeer Milton Friedman, Frenkel is a graduate of the University of Chicago, and taught economics there. His job is to help Netanyahu deliver Friedmanesque reforms to the still largely socialized Israeli economy: slashing spending, cutting taxes and breaking up monopolies. Netanyahu's Director of Policy Planning and Communications is David Bar-Illan, the outgoing executive editor of the Jerusalem Post. Bar-Illan, a dual U.S.-Israeli national, spent nearly all his adulthood in the U.S. He is a contributor to Commentary, the journal of the American neoconservative movement.

Netanyahu's connections to American conservatives are strong. He is friendly with Jack Kemp and columnists George Will and William Safire. Jeane Kirkpatrick, who served as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations under Ronald Reagan, is "like a spiritual mother" to Netanyahu, says an official at a leading American-Jewish organization. Netanyahu's views on foreign policy were formed by his father, who expounded the muscular Revisionist school of Zionism, but associates say American right-wingers reinforced these opinions. A former Likud official recalls that Netanyahu was much impressed by Ronald Reagan's approach to the Soviet Union, and an Israeli official sees a continuum of influence from Netanyahu's father through Kirkpatrick and others. "His was a one-line, continuous education," the official says.

In the U.S. itself, opinion is divided about Israel's new American-style leader. The Clinton Administration is willing to work with him, but without enthusiasm. Neither in his Inaugural Address nor in his new government's policy guidelines did Netanyahu pledge to abide by the Oslo peace accords, and Washington is gloomy about the future of Israeli-Palestinian relations. Since Netanyahu has ruled out returning the occupied Golan Heights, the Administration has abandoned hope of achieving an Israeli-Syrian peace treaty, the holy grail of Warren Christopher's Mideast diplomacy. But if the White House is less than delighted, a Republican leader in Congress was recently overheard saying of Netanyahu, "He's one of us." The Israelis have not only elected an American-style leader, it seems, they've also elected a Republican.

--With reporting by Dean Fischer/Washington and Eric Silver/Jerusalem

With reporting by DEAN FISCHER/WASHINGTON AND ERIC SILVER/JERUSALEM