Modai Urges Begin’s Government to Resign As Several Ministers Indicate Their Intentions to Quit

Energy Minister Yitzhak Modai, a powerful figure in Likud’s Liberal Party wing, today called for the resignation of Premier Menachem Begin’s government unless it can make rapid and dramatic improvements in its decision-making processes which, Modai said, were in disarray.

He said he would “recommend this” to the Liberal Party and that the Liberals “might well be the one to initiate it.” Modai’s remarks, in an Army Radio interview, came at a time when two other key members of Begin’s Cabinet, Finance Minister Yigal Hurwitz and Education Minister Zevulun Hammer, were each threatening to resign in a bitter dispute over a pay raise for teachers. Should either of them quit, observers said, the Begin government would be in too precarious a position to carry on.

Begin himself apparently recognizes this. While his slim Knesset majority may survive no-confidence challenges in the immediate future even if Hurwitz or Hammer leave, it could not do so indefinitely. Begin is said to prefer an honorable resignation initiated by himself to the ignominy of defeat in the Knesset.

Several newspapers reported today that Begin has resolved to “go to the President” to submit his government’s resignation next Tuesday should Hurwitz or Hammer announce their resignations at the next Cabinet meeting Sunday. A number of newspapers have urged Begin to resign.

SAYS GOVERNMENT SHOULD END ITS TERM

Modai spoke as last ditch efforts were being made to reach a compromise on the teachers pay hike which Hurwitz vigorously opposes and Hammer supports. The Energy Minister said, however, that in his opinion “it won’t matter much” if Hurwitz and Hammer reach a compromise by Sunday.

He said his conclusion that the time has come for the present government to end its term and seek a new mandate from the electorate was reached “weeks ago–before the crisis over teachers pay.” He said it also ante-dated several other crises such as the controversy over the dismissal of Police Inspector General Herzl Shafir and the bitter dispute over cuts in the defense budget.

Modai said there were “deep fissures” in the government’s “staffwork and decision-making processes” and unless they are repaired, the government should go. His views were said to be shared by other Liberal Party leaders, notably Deputy Premier Simcha Ehrlich and Minister of Industry, Commerce and Tourism Gideon Patt who could be expected to support a resignation proposal. It would also be backed by the two Democratic Movement ministers, Deputy Premier Yigael Yadin and Minister of Social Betterment Yisrael Katz.

Should Hurwitz resign, the government would lose the three votes of his Rafi faction. If Hammer, a leader of the National Religious Party, quits it is not certain that the NRP as a whole would leave the coalition. The NRP is in a poor position to face early elections inasmuch as one of its Cabinet members, Religious Affairs Minister Aharon Abu-Hatzeira, is under indictment for bribe-taking and Interior Minister Yosef Burg has been accused of trying to quash a police investigation.

If Begin does resign, political observers believe elections would be held in May as the major parties have no desire for a prolonged care-taker regime. One date mentioned is May 17, exactly three years to the day after Likud’s election victory ended 29 years of Labor Party rule.

Meanwhile, the teachers’ pay dispute is expected to come to a head Sunday. Leaders of the teachers unions met in Tel Aviv today with Eliezer Shmueli, Director General of the Education Ministry and MK Shlomo Lorincz of the Aguda Israel, chairman of the Knesset’s Finance Committee to discuss a compromise formula worked out by Lorincz. But majority opinion in the union’s executives seemed to be to reject the formula.