Herut Stands Pat on Issues

The 12th national convention of Herut ended today without modifying in the slightest degree the party’s militant stand on the issues of peace with the Arabs and territorial concessions that are the main obstacles to the establishment of a national unity coalition government. The undisputed leadership of Menachem Beigin was strongly reaffirmed and delegates unanimously endorsed Beigin’s proposed three-year Middle East cease-fire to allow peace moves to crystalize–a proposal scorned by Premier Yitzhak Rabin as “an unrealistic dream.”

Resolutions adopted at a marathon 28-hour closing session called, among other things for the imposition of Israeli sovereignty (annexation) of the “liberated areas of the motherland” demanded immediate new elections on grounds that “the present government has no moral justification to continue in office” and branded the government’s policy of trading territory for political concessions in stages as a “dangerous illusion” that would only bring the enemy closer to Israel’s population centers.

Herut was willing to grant Israeli citizenship to “every Palestinian Arab who wishes it and who pledges loyalty to the State.” Other Arabs would be permitted to retain previous citizenships and would be accorded the rights of permanent residents in Israel. Herut called on the government, the Knesset and world Jewry to “intensify the struggle for Jewish emigration from the Soviet Union and for the salvation of Syrian Jews.”

It also called for an intensification of Israeli propaganda abroad including the establishment of special Likud propaganda offices in the United States and Europe to explain the true and just interests of Israel “in face of the failure of the official Israeli propaganda to do this.”