Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir is seeking to mollify David Levy over what the foreign minister considers an intrusion into his foreign policy domain by Defense Minister Moshe Arens.
But observers here detect a devious game being played at the top echelons of the Likud government aimed at isolating Levy, who may have emerged as too independent a foreign minister for Shamir’s taste.
Levy was furious that Arens visited Washington four days before his own scheduled visit, meeting not only with his U.S. counterpart, Defense Secretary Dick Cheney, but with President Bush and with Secretary of State James Baker, whom Levy was scheduled to see Friday.
Levy abruptly postponed his trip Tuesday.
Shamir, who had been on the sidelines, heaped praise on the foreign minister Wednesday for his recent talks with the German foreign minister, Hans-Dietrich Genscher. They led to German arms assistance to Israel and a revival of submarine building orders Arens was forced to cancel last year for budgetary reasons.
But while the premier seemed to be aware of Levy’s offended sensibilities, political observers believe he is not overly concerned with them.
Even his praise for Levy associated the foreign minister with defense issues, as if to say there was nothing wrong with the defense minister discussing diplomatic topics in Washington.
Sources in the Prime Minister’s Office are saying that Shamir and Levy do not “think alike.” They say Shamir has several “accounts” he wants to settle with Levy, who was long considered a Likud hard-liner.
Shamir is angry at the foreign minister for refusing to vote to confirm Shamir’s appointment of Rehavam Ze’evi of the extreme right-wing Moledet party to the Cabinet. And he disapproves of Levy’s remarks in support of opening a diplomatic process with Syria, which is heresy to Shamir.
The prime minister resents what he considers attempts by Levy to appear to be guiding Israeli foreign policy, especially in the United States.
Shamir, who is allied with Arens in the Likud bloc, is believed to have signaled both Levy and the U.S. administration that he is boss.
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