SYDNEY, Australia (JTA) – Australia’s former prime minister, Kevin Rudd, who expelled an Israeli Mossad agent from Canberra in 2010, was re-elected to help the government remain in power.

In Canberra Wednesday, Prime Minister Julia Gillard, a loyal supporter of Israel during her three years in office, called for a leadership vote in the Labor Party amid plunging polls and mounting evidence that Rudd is more popular.

Lawmakers on Wednesday night voted for Rudd to lead the party, by a tally of 57 to 45. The federal election is scheduled for Sept. 14 ­– controversially coinciding with Yom Kippur.

Junior cabinet minister Michael Danby, one of two Jews in government, told JTA just as he was arriving to the vote that he would back Gillard.

While many government lawmakers face defeat in the next federal election, Danby’s heavily Jewish seat in Melbourne would require a swing of almost 8 percent.

His Jewish parliamentary colleague, Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus, has a margin of about 10 percent and also is favored to keep his seat.

Ginette Searle, executive director of the Zionist Federation of Australia, expressed “sincere thanks” to Gillard for being a “staunch supporter” of Israel and the Jewish community.

Danny Lamm, president of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry, told JTA from Israel: “She was outstanding in her support of Israel most notably during the operation in Gaza [in 2009] when she strongly asserted Israel’s rights to defend itself, when she stood by Israel with the first UNGA vote on the Palestinians and her attempts (ultimately unsuccessful) to retain that position last year.”

Rudd, who was prime minister from 2007 to 2010 before being deposed in a coup to install Gillard, told Jewish leaders during the 2007 election campaign that Israel was “in my DNA.”

He successfully led Australia’s bid for a temporary U.N. Security Council seat but was accused of compromising support for Israel in a bid to woo Arab votes.

A longtime supporter of Israel, Rudd was “not impressed” when it became clear that Australian passports were compromised in the assassination of Hamas leader Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in Dubai in January 2010.

In response, his government expelled Israel’s Mossad agent from the embassy in the capital.

Bilateral relations also were strained earlier this year following revelations that Melbourne-born Ben Zygier was “Prisoner X,” the secret inmate who committed suicide in prison in 2010 after reportedly spilling secrets to Hezbollah.