The Knesset’s Finance Committee today approved 240 million Shekels in government funding for yeshivas, and other religious institutions affiliated with the Aguda Israel and the National Religious Party. The measure is expected to end the quarrel between Premier Menachem Begin and his Aguda coalition partners who complained that the government was moving too slowly to provide the funds it promised as part of the coalition agreement.
Their differences were aggravated when Begin castigated the Aguda’s four-man Knesset faction for abstaining in the vote to apply Israeli law on the Golan Heights. The MKs were acting on the instructions of the party’s Council of Sages which considers the move needlessly provocative. Begin accused them of violating the coalition pact.
The Finance Committee vote, only hours before the Aguda Israel’s World Executive (Vaad Hapoel) convened here, is expected to forestall further criticism of the government by Aguda leaders. Economic sources said Begin promised the Orthodox faction a total of 700 million Shekels for its religious institutions. Finance Committee chairman Shlomo Lorincz, an Aguda MK, said the monies voted would be shared with the NRP.
Labor Alignment members of the committee abstained. Labor sources explained that they didn’t want attention focussed on the division within the faction between members who strongly opposed the religious grants on principle and others prepared to go along with them provided the monies are closely supervised by State agencies. Labor is interested in maintaining good relations with the Aguda MKs who have expressed doubts about some of Begin’s policies.
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