The 15th convention of the Histadrut will open in Jerusalem tonight and continue in Tel Aviv tomorrow for two days of deliberations. A Likud boycott of the meeting was averted today when the congress organizers agreed that Likud Minister of Labor Moshe Katzav will address the gathering immediately after a speech by Prime Minister Shimon Peres tomorrow.
The Likud had threatened to boycott the convention because they claimed that the Histadrut leadership – almost completely Labor Party and leftwing elements – had not invited Deputy Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir and other Likud leaders to address the gathering.
Histadrut spokesmen said that Shamir had been invited to attend and had accepted. David Levy had also been invited to attend but is out of the country, they said.
While Menachem Begin was Prime Minister, he was not invited to address the Histadrut convention, on the grounds that he was not a member of the labor federation.
Meanwhile Likud delegates to the convention have announced that they will not stand at attention during the traditional singing of the International, the workers anthem. Tonight, for the first time, delegates will be using new words for the International, written at the request of the labor federation by Israeli poet Haim Heffer.
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