The Labor Party’s 600-member Central Committee meeting here tonight to select a successor to Premier Golda Meir, postponed its decision until tomorrow to allow additional candidates to be named. Only two candidates’ names–Labor Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Information Minister Shimon Peres–were before the committee when it convened. Seven other potential candidates had either taken them selves out of the race or were persuaded to do so.
But the party’s five-member committee appointed to draw up a list of candidates, indicated tonight that it would try to persuade Justice Minister Chaim Zadok to enter the competition although Zadok has insisted he was not a candidate for the Premiership. It set 10 a.m. tomorrow as the deadline for submitting a final list. The party faced other alternatives–a motion by Deputy Premier Yigal Allon, to call for new-elections until which time the present care-taker government will remain in office; and the establishment of a national unity coalition embracing the opposition Likud, a proposal advanced by the former Rafi faction.
At last reports, Rabin, Israel’s former Ambassador to the U.S. and a former Chief of Staff, seemed the most likely to inherit the mantle of leadership. His candidacy was staunchly supported by party strongman Pinhas Sapir, the Finance Minister, who represents Labor’s Mapai faction. While Mrs. Meir has maintained strict neutrality, Sapir, who apparently could have had the Premiership for himself for the asking, came out publicly for Rabin. He refused a plea from Peres to remain neutral and bluntly discouraged another would-be contender. Foreign Minister Abba Eban, from entering the race.
ANTI-RABIN CAMPAIGN LAUNCHED BY WEIZMAN
Peres is supported by Rafi and by some Mapai leaders. But Rafi is less than enthusiastic over the prospect of trying to form a new Labor-led coalition along the same lines as the outgoing one. It has called either for new elections or for a national unity government embracing the opposition Likud.
Even before the Central Committee meeting tonight. Likud leader Gen. Ezer Weizman launched an anti-Rabin campaign. Meeting with several Labor Party leaders, Sapir among them, the former Air Force commander who served in Premier Meir’s short-lived national unity government in 1970, claimed that Rabin was not qualified for the highest leadership post. The National Religious Party indicated meanwhile that it would wait to see who Labor selected as its leader before deciding whether or not to join a new coalition. Due to a paper shortage, today’s Daily News Bulletin is printed on a different stock paper.
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