Rabin Survives No Confidence As Closure Sparks New Debate

The government of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin withstood a no-confidence motion this week that centered on the closure of the territories.

The no-confidence motion was submitted Monday after Rabin’s statements last week that he had agreed to lift the closure partially on the West Bank and Gaza Strip even though it posed a security threat to Israelis.

The motion was defeated by a vote of 59 to 48.

“Someone who puts the concerns of the enemy before his own people cannot represent this government,” said Likud leader Benjamin Netanyahu, who traded insults with Rabin during Knesset debate over the motion.

The fervently religious Shas Party, formerly a member of the governing coalition, voted with the opposition.

In defense of his recent decision to gradually ease the closure, Rabin said long closures on the territories in 1993 had only generated more terrorist acts.

The latest closure was imposed following a Jan. 22 double suicide bombing near Netanya that killed 21 Israelis.

The government recently eased the closure, allowing some 15,000 Palestinians from the territories to enter Israel.

Israeli authorities also temporarily suspended the closure last Friday, allowing West Bank Palestinians to attend special services at the Temple Mount in Jerusalem. The services marked the last Friday in the Islamic holy month of Ramadan.

Various local news reports put the number of Palestinians attending the Temple mount prayers at 70,000 to 160,000 people.

Some 1,700 Israeli police were deployed throughout eastern Jerusalem as part of additional security measures. No incidents were reported.

The closure issue also came up Monday when Finance Minister Avraham Shohat met with Ahmed Karia, the Palestinian Authority official in charge of economic affairs, to discuss economic issues relating to the Palestinian self-rule accord.

At the meeting in the West Bank enclave of Jericho, the Palestinians emphasized the economic hardships the closure has created for Palestinians attempting to work in Israel.

Karia called on Israel to issue more permits for Palestinian workers.

But at its weekly meeting Sunday, the Israeli Cabinet decided not to implement an additional easing of the closure.

Rabin said Sunday that he plans to import thousands of foreign workers to Israel in a move aimed at entirely eliminating the need for Palestinian laborers.

“In four months, I can bring in 20,000 to 25,000 workers,” Rabin said, adding that after they are imported, “there will be no need for any Palestinians in the territories to come to Israel.”

Some 65,000 foreign workers, most of them from Thailand and Romania, now work in Israel. Israeli officials have set a target of 90,000.

At Monday’s meeting in Jericho, Israeli and Palestinian members of the Israeli- Palestinian Joint Economic Committee agreed in principle to create four industrial parks in Gaza and seven in the West Bank.

The United States is expected to provide financial support to build these areas, according to Israel Radio.

Karia rejected a proposal made the day before by Communications Minister Shulamit Aloni that Israel offer land in the Negev to the Palestinians in exchange for West Bank areas around Jerusalem, where Israeli settlements are being built.

“Expanding the Gaza Strip should not be at the expense of other Palestinian land in the West Bank,” Karia said.

Aloni, who had opposed a recent government decision to continue construction of settlements surrounding Jerusalem, said the Palestinians lack room.

“It’s sort of an exchange of lands,” she said of her proposal.

Members of the Likud opposition called on the prime minister to fire Aloni for her remarks.