As Israel goes to the polls Tuesday, a controversial hardliner Avigdor Lieberman, who advocates "transfer" of Arab population and whose party's slogan is "No loyalty, No Citizenship", is likely to emerge the kingmaker.
Opinion polls have predicted that Lieberman's 'Yisrael Beteinu' party is likely to eclipse the Labour party to emerge the third largest faction in the new parliament. It also considers the hard ground realities that none of the leading candidates for premiership have ruled him out of their coalition.
Amid a right wing surge in the country after the Gaza attack, the controversial political figure's meteoric rise in politics continues despite being tainted by allegations of corruption.
Yisrael Beteinu has emerged victorious in mock elections recently held in ten schools across the country and most of the people campaigning for the party are young.
Lieberman was greeted across Israel by his young supporters with slogans of "the next Prime Minister", "Death to the Arabs" and "No loyalty, No citizenship".
He has, however, ruled himself out of the chances of becoming the prime minister in the elections. But with his growing popularity in the upcoming generation of Israelis who are likely to vote only in the next parliamentary elections, he sees the coveted position in striking distance.
The Moldavian born politician has evoked a debate in the country's schools with some teachers arguing that his ideology is against the democratic norms of the country.
Unnerved by the opposition among the teachers, the young students who support Lierberman describe him as the only politician who is not a "hypocrite".
His recent statements calling uponv Israeli-Arab parliamentarians who met Hamas be executed like Nazi collaborators after the Nuremburg trials and that Israel should "continue to fight Hamas just like the US did with the
Japanese in World War II" seem to have a massive appeal in a population.
The statements draw the people's support as Israel faces security threats from Hizbullah in the north and Hamas in the south.
Lierberman is under investigation for fraud, embezzlement and money-laundering, even though he denies any wrong doing and says the probe is "politically" motivated.
Lieberman's party draws much of its support from the one million Jews who came to Israel after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991.
He was elected to the last three Knessets and has served as minister at various points of time, including a brief stint as Minister for Strategic Affairs in Ehud Olmert's government.
The frontrunner in opinion polls, opposition leader Benjamin Netanyahu has a pact with Lieberman over not politically targeting each other during campaign and Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni closing in on Netanyahu in a tight race has dropped hints that she will include the Russian leader in her coalition, despite reservations.
Even if Livni manages to secure more seats for her Kadima party than Netanyahu's Likud party, poll predictions say that the right bloc will have a clear majority in the next Knesset and given the foreign minister's loathing for the Shas party, Lieberman's inclusion in her coalition seems unavoidable.
Liebarman has called for swapping swathes of Israeli-Arab populated territory in Israel with Israeli settlement blocs in the West Bank. He is also for the law that demands Israeli-Arabs to pledge allegiance to Israel as a Jewish state and committing them to some form of national service.