Former Foreign Minister Moshe Dayan said today that he has decided to run in the June 30 elections at the head of a new centrist political faction yet to be formed. But he will not make a formal announcement until he returns from a trip to Spain early next month.
Addressing the Foreign Press Association here, Dayan said he needed time to examine the proposed list and the political, economic and social platform which it will present to the electorate. He said of the new faction, “We have been called a center list but we are not bourgeois. We are a labor movement but not a party.” According to Dayan, the list will be composed of workers, academicians and “Orientals, not just because they are Oriental but because they are good people.”
He did not identify any of the names on the list but said he wanted to make sure they are all compatible with his views and would stand by their decision to join him. He said the new faction would not seek to join a coalition government, whether led by Labor or Likud. “We shall be in opposition and vote for or against either Labor or Likud on the merits of the case,” he said.
Dayan’s platform is expected to incorporate his plan for Israel’s unilateral implementation of autonomy on the West Bank which was rejected by the Likud government while he was still a member of the Cabinet. According to the latest public opinion poll published March 13, a list headed by Dayan would win 19 Knesset seats if elections were held now, mostly at the expense of the Labor Alignment.
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