Eliav Says Israel’s Strength is Due to Synthesis of Zionism and Socialism

The character of Israel’s Labor Party was defined today as “Zionist in the terms of the seventies and socialist in terms of humane socialism.” The speaker was Aryeh Eliav, the Party’s dovish Secretary General who delivered the keynote address at the opening of the Labor Party’s first national convention since it was formed by the merger of three labor factions in the aftermath of the Six-Day War. He spoke to some 3,000 delegate representing 280,000 Party members. Also in the audience were 50 members of visiting socialist groups abroad including Socialist Parties-in-exile from Spain, Greece, Estonia, Hungary and Poland. David Ben-Gurion, Israel’s 84-year-old former Premier occupied the place of honor next to Eliav on the dias. His entrance was greeted by a two-minute standing ovation. Another honored guest was former United States Supreme Court Justice and former UN Ambassador Arthur J. Goldberg who is attending the convention in a private capacity. Eliav stressed that Israel’s strength lay in “the fruitful synthesis of Zionism and socialism.”

He observed that modern socialism was being challenged from the Left and the Right and declared: “The Labor Party rejects doctrinaire communism which has distorted the teachings of the trail-blazers of socialism. It rejects the dictatorial and totalitarian regimes of Eastern Europe and of some other countries no less than we reject the reactionary slogans of the extreme Right throughout the world…Our socialism is humane…It calls for unity of action but does not impose uniformity of opinion.” According to observers here, a test of that concept will come when the convention gets down to the business of electing members to its powerful central committee, its governing body between conventions. They said the elections would indicate how firmly the three constituent factions of Labor–Mapai, Rafi and Achdut Avodah–have been welded into a united political entity during the past three and-a-half years.