Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion, who left today on an official vacation of five to six weeks, has prepared and signed a letter of resignation ready for submission if he fails to obtain firm support from both the Israel Cabinet and his Mapai party in his fight against Pinhas Lavon, the former Defense Minister who was exonerated at a Cabinet meeting in the “Lavon Affair” over the Prime Minister’s opposition.
Press reports said today that the Prime Minister suggested, in his resignation letter, that Moshe Sharett, former Prime Minister, be nominated to succeed him both as Prime Minister and Defense Minister. At the same time, it was reported that twice during the past 24 hours, Deputy Defense Minister Shimon Peres and other Mapai party leaders backing the Prime Minister visited him at his home in an effort to persuade him not to submit his letter of resignation.
In a counter to reports of the Prime Minister’s threats to resign, sources close to Mr. Lavon were circulating a report today that Mr. Lavon might resign as secretary-general of the Histadrut, Israel’s Labor Federation, if the Cabinet reversed a decision, made two weeks ago, which cleared him of the responsibility for a 1954 “security mishap” which brought about his resignation in 1955.
That reversal was one of Mr. Ben-Gurion’s ultimatum demands. The other was for a judicial inquiry to go into the entire situation. The Cabinet vote exonerating Mr. Lavon was on a unanimous report of a Ministerial Committee which cleared the Histadrut official and charged that an unnamed senior army officer forged a document which made it appear that Mr. Lavon had ordered the disastrous action.
A meeting of the Secretariat of the Mapai scheduled for today in a new effort to prevent a wide-open split in the ranks of the party to which both the Prime Minister and Mr. Lavon belong, was postponed first for 24 hours and then until Wednesday. It was not certain that it would be held even then because no solution appeared to be in the offing which would satisfy the Prime Minister without “sacrificing” Mr. Lavon.
ISRAEL PARLIAMENT SCHEDULED TO DISCUSS DISPUTE TODAY
The next public airing of the widening dispute was scheduled for tomorrow at a session, of the Knesset, Israel’s Parliament. The General Zionists put on the agenda an urgent motion to discuss the “interrupted work of the Government” caused by the Prime Minister’s lengthy and abrupt vacation and his resignation threat. The General Zionists indicated plans to press the contention that the issue was a national affair and not merely of party concern.
As a former Chief of Staff, Gen. Moshe Dayan submitted documents to a Knesset committee yesterday purporting to disprove Mr. Lavons charge that an order was given without his knowledge as Defense Minister and that another order was carried out contrary to his instructions. General Dayan placed the documents after a majority of Israel’s Cabinet held Sunday that while the issue before it was considered closed, it was authorizing Justice Minister Pinhas Rosen to place Gen. Dayan’s report before the Knesset Committee together with the unanimous findings of the Ministerial Committee.
Mr. Lavon widened the dispute in a published interview today in which he warned he would not acquiesce in any unilateral investigation by the Knesset Security committee. He said in the interview that, in any such investigation, he would demand that the Prime Minister also be investigated.
The Knesset debate may disclose the existence of three Mapai factions in the dispute, One is made up of Education Minister Abba Eban, Agricultural Minister Moshe Dayan and Labor Minister Giora Josephtal, who were reported ready to support the Prime Minister to the last. Another was comprised of Mrs. Golda Meir, Foreign Minister, and Minister of Commerce and Industry Pinhas Sapir, who were reported not inclined to bale out the Prime Minister out of fear of setting a dangerous precedent of overturning a majority Cabinet vote. Both were reported ready to resign over the issue.
The third was made up of Finance Minister Levi Eshkol and Minister of Police Behor Shitreet who, having served on the Ministerial Committee, would not countenance a reversal of the unanimous findings which they helped to formulate.
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