Sharp Debate Between Likud and Labor over West Bank Policies

A Hadash (Communist) no-confidence motion on the government’s West Bank policy provided the arena for a sharp debate today in the Knesset between Likud and Labor. The vote itself was a foregone conclusion: only the Hadash MKs voted for their own motion while Telem and Tehiya joined the coalition parties and Labor and Shinui abstained.

But during the debate there were blistering exchanges between Premier Menachem Begin, from his seat, and Labor’s Mordechai Gur, on the rostrum. Following Gur’s savage attacks on the government, Likud sent its young firebrand, Ehud Olmert, to speak and he accused Labor’s former Chief of Staff of having a “psychological complex” about anything to do with Defense Minister Ariel Sharon. Sharon himself demonstratively left the Knesset chamber as Gur began to talk.

TERMS WEST BANK POLICY ‘IMMORAL’

Gur charged that the government’s West Bank policies were “aggressive and immoral” and were “giving the Israel Defense Force a bad name.” He said the policies were putting soldiers into “impossible situation.” Replying for the government, Justice Minister Moshe Nissim said the tough measures taken of late to quell disturbances on the West Bank “give no enjoyment to any of us” but were essential to “the fight to preserve the peace process.”

Gur’s strictures were especially effective as they came one day after an unprecedented press conference by six reserve officers, two of them majors, who charged that the IDF was “losing its human face” in the administered territories.

The six, among them Maj. Yuval Neriya, one of only eight Israelis decorated for valor, said the “threshold of squeezing the trigger” had become dangerously low, and they hinted at frequent and widespread acts of physical repression by the security-forces.

The press conference — the first time army officers have spoken out against the IDF like this in public — was organized by the Peace Now movement and it drew sharp criticism from the Defense Ministry for “political exploitation.” But the Ministry said the officers’ specific allegations would be investigated.

Mapam MKs said subsequently that their party will watch closely for results of the Army’s investigation. Peace Now itself has indicated that if the investigation is unsatisfactory, the allegations will be made public.

A WAVE OF COMPLAINTS

Peace Now said today the six officers’ public appearance had triggered a wave of complaints channelled to Peace Now from other IDF reservists who had witnessed excesses in the administered areas. These, too, would be passed on to the military for investigation.

The Mapam-affiliated Kibbutz Artzi movement last week issued guidelines to its serving soldiers urging them to obey all orders while on duty in the territories unless such orders were grossly and palpably illegal and immoral. The movement urged its soldiers to obey first–in all but the most extreme cases — and then file complaints with the Kibbutz leadership.

Over recent weeks soldiers in both the Kibbutz Artzi and the Labor-affiliated United Kibbutz Movement have been urged to report to Kibbutz elders at weekends on any excesses that they have witnessed during their week’s service. Many of the cases are then transmitted to the army on an informal basis with the demand that they be investigated.