Mrs. Meir Issues Plea for Coexistence Between Secular, Religious Sectors

A strong plea for coexistence between the religious and secular sectors of the Jewish State was made last night by Premier Golda Meir in an address to the convention here of the Religious Zionists of America. The question of such a coexistence, she said, was as vital to Israel as her border problems. Alluding to the fact that the conversation delegates were not Israeli residents, Mrs. Meir remarked; “Don’t think that when you have passed a resolution you have settled anything. You have to live with it,” The Premier warned against expelling anyone from the Jewish community or nation, noting that the Nazi Holocaust and a half-century of Bolshevism in the Soviet Union had seriously compromised the Jewish nation’s human resources. “Now that the remnants are with us,” she asked, “can we so lightly bar them?” The new Chief Rabbi of Tel Aviv, former Army chaplain Shlomo Goren, said in a speech preceding Mrs. Meir’s that halacha can be made flexible–an obvious reference to the case of the “mamzerim,” two members of the Israel Defense Forces who have been barred from marrying because they are deemed illegitimate. But, he said, contravening halacha is another matter entirely.