The Labor Party’s Central Committee voted decisively Thursday night to resume negotiations with Likud for a broad-based coalition government.
Likud, still bogged down in talks with the ultra-Orthodox and far right-wing parties, was unable to present Labor with the fait accompli of a narrow governing majority, as Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir had hoped to do before the Central Committee voted.
Israel Radio announced the secret vote was 690-390 in favor of an alliance with Likud, as urged by party leader Shimon Peres and almost all other Laborites of ministerial rank.
Israel Television shortly afterward said the vote was 638-349. By either count, it was evident that many of the Central Committee’s 1,300-plus members did not cast ballots.
But simmering discontent with the party’s leadership, widely blamed for its weaker-than-anticipated showing in the Nov. 1 Knesset elections, did not surface at the Central Committee session, contrary to the predictions of some observers.
The committee was convened in response to a dramatic plea Monday by President Chaim Herzog for the two major parties to get together and form a broad, stable government for the good of the country.
Its decision reversed that of the party’s 120-member leadership bureau, which defied Peres by rejecting a new approach to Likud in an upset vote here Nov. 30.
On Thursday night, there were three speakers for and three against seeking a new partnership with Likud.
PROMISE TO BUILD SETTLEMENTS
In favor were Peres, who is foreign minister in the outgoing Labor-Likud unity government, Defense Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Education Minister Yitzhak Navon, a former president of Israel. Opposing it were Labor Party Secretary-General Uzi Baram; Yitzhak Ben-Aharon, the 83-year-old former secretary-general of Histadrut; and Michael Bar-Zohar, a Knesset member and longtime critic of the present party leadership.
Peres put his position as chairman on the line in an impassioned plea. “My head is in your hands,” he said. “Anyone who wants to cut it off can do so.”
He took issue with Baram for saying that Labor “demeaned itself” by its efforts to woo the Orthodox parties away from Likud with lavish promises of religious concessions.
According to Peres, Labor pursued the religious extremists “in order to hoist our flag of peace . . . to find a majority for peace . . . What is demeaning in that?”
In Jerusalem, meanwhile, Likud signed a coalition accord with the far right-wing Tehiya party. It pledged, among other things, to build 40 new Jewish settlements in the administered territories over the next four years.
Asked what would happen if Labor decided to hold coalition talks with Likud, Tehiya leader Yuval Ne’eman replied, “That’s Labor’s problem.”
But Peres and other Laborites made clear that their decision to negotiate with Likud is contingent on its reopening the agreements it reached with the religious parties and keeping the three secular right-wing parties — Tehiya, Tsomet and Moledet — out of the projected government.
“We will go with the Orthodox, because we courted them,” Rabin declared. But Labor would not be part of any government committed to a massive settlement plan.
JTA has documented Jewish history in real-time for over a century. Keep our journalism strong by joining us in supporting independent, award-winning reporting.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
