Jerusalem - Israelis are choosing a new mayor of Jerusalem Tuesday. Several candidates are competing to replace Uri Lupolianski, who in 2003 became the city's first ultra-Orthodox mayor when elected to succeed Ehud Olmert, currently Israel's premier.

The leading ones are:

Nir Barkat, a 49-year-old high-tech entrepreneur, who made a fortune with his computer software company BRM. A secular Jew running as an independent, he lost narrowly to ultra-Orthodox Lupoliasnki in 2003 and as such has been heading the city council's "opposition."

He has pledged to use his business acumen to alleviate poverty in Jerusalem, promote job creation and make housing more affordable. To tackle the city's housing problem, he among others backs the construction of a new, controversial Jewish neighbourhood on land in occupied East Jerusalem. Barkat is married and a father of three daughters.

His main rival is Meir Porush, a 53-year-old ultra-Orthodox rabbi who like Lupolianski is a member of the United Torah Judaism party. He enjoys the support of Jerusalem's growing ultra-Orthodox population, who are becoming increasingly influential, not least because the city's Palestinian population largely boycotts the municipal elections.

The father of 12 however has also tried to appeal to Jerusalem's secular residents, pledging not only to try and stop the exodus of non-religious Jews from the city, but also to bring in 100,000 new inhabitants, both secular and religious, in the next decade. Jerusalem currently has over 730,000 residents, about two thirds of them Jews and one third Arabs.

Arkady Gaydamak, 56, a third, controversial candidate, is a Russian-born billionaire is suspected of money laundering and involvement in a major international arms deal scandal to Angola, and accused by critics of trying to buy his popularity by lavishly handing out gifts and donations. He has defended himself by saying he is a philanthropist.

Among his activities, he paid for and organized shelter for thousands of Israelis who fled northern Israel during the 2006 second Lebanon war, to the embarrassment and anger of the Israeli government, which stood accused of failure to aide the northern Israel residents itself. He also bussed hundreds of people from the rocket-stricken Israeli town of Sderot, near the Gaza Strip, to expensive get-away holidays in the Red Sea resort of Eilat.

Gaydamak, who addresses reporters in English with a thick Russian accent because his Hebrew is poor, owns the city's Beitar Jerusalem football club, as well as several newspapers in Russia and France. He has stayed permanently in Israel since 2000 and formed his party, Social Justice, in early 2007, initially claiming it was a non- political movement fighting for social welfare. (dpa)