Mapam to Back Government in Geneva

Mapam leader Yaacov Hazan said last night that the Party would back the government at the Geneva peace conference and predicted that its outcome would be an acceptable compromise. The government will go to Geneva with a maximalist position but will gradually give up ground and stand on a plan very close to Mapam’s peace plan, Hazan told a meeting of the Kibbutz Artzi Executive at Ein Hamfratz.

The Mapam kibbutz movement voted 47-0 with 23 abstentions in favor of the resignation of Defense Minister Moshe Dayan. Hazan’s colleague, Mapam veteran leader Meir Yaari, claimed that Dayan alone should not be blamed for mistakes by the government. He said Deputy Premier Yigal Allon was no more a dove than Dayan and that the “Allon Plan” was not calculated to bring peace with the Arabs. The movement agreed to back Premier Golda Meir. though with reservations and on condition that she does not reappoint Dayan when she forms a new government after the Dec. 31 elections. Mapam is a member of the Labor Alignment.

While calling on Dayan to resign in acknowledgement of the mistakes for which he was responsible, Hazan said Mapam itself was not blameless for the situation that existed before the Yom Kippur War. “We lived as if there was no tomorrow.” he told his colleagues. “We let ourselves deal with marginal problems and tried to forget that the Arab world wants to destroy Israel. We allowed permissiveness and abandoned Socialist education. We replaced ideology with psychology.” He added, however, that even while the conflict with the Arabs continues, “we shall continue to believe in ultimate Arab-Jewish peace.”