Meir Yaari, retiring as secretary general of Mapam after 52 years of leadership in that party and its affiliated movements, urged Mapam last night not to abandon its alignment with the Labor Party last “the chauvinist reactionary alternative” come to power, Yaari warned that if Mapam quits the alignment, a move advocated by some of the party’s younger elements, “the opportunists in the Labor Party might reach a compromise with the right-wing.”
The veteran Mapam leader issued his warning in his farewell address to Mapam’s sixth national convention here in the presence of President Zalman Shazar, Premier Golda Meir, and Knesset Speaker Israel Yeshayahu, who were attending as guests. He offered a mild rebuke to Mrs. Meir for not having expressed often enough Israel’s readiness to respond to any Jordanian offer for negotiations without prior conditions. But he also criticized “those among us (Mapam) who claim that Hussein opened the door to talks while Israel shut it.”
Yaari had sharper words for Defense Minister Moshe Dayan who he charged, “does not gamble on the card of peace but rather on that of time, the Army and the eventual submission of the inhabitants of the territories.” He said Dayan’s hope was that the Arabs would come to accept Israeli control over the territories even if it takes another ten years. “If that is Indeed the Dayan plan, then it Is not a plan for peace,” Yaari said. However, he added, he preferred to remain in the Alignment camp “for there is the chance that he (Dayan) might repent.”
BEIGIN-WEIZMAN RIFT HEALS
In another political development, the breach between Herut leader Menachem Beigin and the party’s former No. 2 man, Gen. Ezer Weizman, appeared to be healed — on Belgian’s terms. Weizman resigned last week as chairman of the Herut executive after the party’s 11th national convention elected a 250-member Central Committee made up largely of Beigin supporters. But Beigin and Weizman met last night at Beigin’s home and reportedly reached an agreement where by Beigin will fill Weizman’s former post in addition to his overall leadership position in Herut.
Weizman, a former Air Force commander and former Transport Minister, was given the job of heading Herut election campaign headquarters, a sensitive and difficult job in view of the turbulence within the party as it begins campaigning for next year’s Knesset elections. Beigin has named Knesset member Chaim Landau as executive party chairman. The new arrangements are expected to be confirmed by the Central Committee which holds its first meeting next Sunday.
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