National unity government?
Israel faces two deep political conflicts: the Oslo "peace" process, and privatisation. The leadership of the right-wing bloc in the Knesset is calling for a national unity government. Prime Minister Netanyahu, and some Labour leaders, may privately agree with them. Tikva Honig-Parnass The first policy of such a government would be to continue the settlement policies of the previous Labour-Meretz government. Acording to the Likud mayor of Maaleh Adumim (a large settlement between Jerusalem and Jericho), "A national unity government with Labour would promote construction activity in Yesha [West Bank], which is now completely frozen... [Likud Foreign Minister] David Levy is not a big supporter of the settlements. But it might be possible to come to an agreement with [Labour Leader Shimon] Peres on continuing construction." Bringing the Labour Party into the government would "neutralise the pressures emanating from the Americans, the Palestinians and the current opposition of the Left to the policy of strengthening the settlements"
Netanyahu needs the help of the Labour Party to strengthen his position against the sharp criticism against him emanating from the extreme Right and from members of the Likud for not fulfilling his electoral promises not to continue the Oslo policies of the previous Labour government. When Netanyahu was invited to address a convention of the far Right Moledet Party (which supports the 'transfer' of the Palestinian-Arabs out of their homeland), he was met with jeers and cat-calls: "liar" ', "hypocrite', and 'architect of the Munich Accords'. Similarly, in a demonstration of 'Women in Green' against the proposed Hebron agreement, a number of women held signs accusing Netanyahu of treason.
Criticism from the Right is likely to intensify, as the negotiations with the Palestinian Authority progress. Militant anti-Oslo Knesset members from Likud and the NRP met last month to discuss re-establishing a "Land of Israel Front", which would include all the members of the governing coalition who oppose the Oslo Accords.
On 30 December, the Moledet faction in the Knesset submitted a no-confidence motion concerning the proposed agreement on re-deployment in Hebron. Four cabinet ministers were absent during the vote (Ariel Sharon (Likud), Rafael Eitan (Tsomet), Yitzhak Levy (NRP) and Zevulun Hammer athé (NRP)). They were joined by another 14 Knesset members from the governing coalition, including members of the Likud.
Later that day, the government and the coalition received another blow when the Knesset plenary refused to eliminate a subsidy for working women, as proposed in the 1997 budget. Representatives of the Russian immigrants' party, Yisrael B'Aliya, the NRP, the Third Way, and David Levy's Gesher faction voted against the government.
"We can't go on this way, " Netanyahu thundered. "This isn't a coalition. I am not able to get anything passed in the Knesset with this coalition. If this situation continues and we lose more important votes, I will be obliged to re-think the composition of the government'' Is Labour waiting in the wings? Beginning of workers' struggle against privatisation?
At the end of December, Israel witnessed a tremendous display of strength by the Histadrut (General Federation of Workers) and the country's largest workers' committees. On the morning of December 29, the head of the Trade Union Department of the Histadrut (considered the no.2 leader of the Federation) was arrested for violating an order of the labour court concerning a dock workers' strike a few days earlier. Such an arrest of a top leader of the Histadrut was unprecedented. On the spot, Labour MK Amir Peretz, who is the Histadrut Chairperson, ordered — by mobile phone — a strike of the entire public and state sector, including air and seaports, telephone services, hospitals and governmental offices. Within 40 minutes, the strike had taken hold all over the country.
The rage and frustration of the working public, as well as the potential for genuine leadership exhibited by Peretz, would not have been enough to guarantee the success of the strike without the support of the major workers' committees, representing workers in key, relatively well paid sectors like the National Electric Company, the military industries, the aircraft industry, sea and airport authority employees of the water company, Bank Le'umi, the telephone company, and the General Sick Fund. When the heads of these workers' committees joined the Histadrut Strike Team, the result was a general strike.
One of the main motivations for the strike was a series of votes in the Knesset concerning cuts in social spending in the proposed 1997 budget. For example, the Prime Minister refused Histadrut leader Peretz' suggestion to delay the vote on the reduction of the compensatory subsidy for working women. The prime minister hoped that he would force the Histadrut to reconsider, in the light of the balance of power between them. He failed.
What most concers the larger workers committees is the threat of privatisation. They are deeply anxious about the attack on collective bargaining agreements and their replacement by "individual contracts", which could destroy the existing norms of work relations in Israel and bring about the full "privatisation" of the labour market.
1996 saw the success of Peretz' efforts to build a spiral of dialogue and co-operation
February 1997#285 23
* Israel/Palestine with the big, powerful workers' committees, which had not existed for at least a decade.
But this is a complex process. The Histadrut is now dependent on the tremendous power embodied in these workers' committees, which are capable of paralysing whole sectors of the economy. But it is also possible that the big workers committees have decided that the new Histadrut — which has been released from its commitments as an owner of factories and banks after selling Hevrat Ha'ovdim (the "Workers' Holding Company"), is now free to support workers' struggles without having to take account of "alien" considerations. The big workers committees and the new Histadrut may unite in a refusal front' against the privatisation plans. The massive strike in the first week of January has already sent a warning to the government that its privatisation plans cannot be realised without the co-operation of the workers movement.
And it has been made clear to Netanyahu and Treasury Minister Meridor that from now on it will no longer be as easy to carry out privatisation as it was under the Labour government, when the Histadrut was the biggest privatiser in the country, and when the Labour government and the Histadrut leadership were able to manipulate the workers into maintaining that industrial quiet so necessary for the smooth implementation of privatisation.
A national unity government with the participation of those Labour representatives who support privatisation and the free market would help Likud's to weaken the participation of the workers' committees in the privatisation process. Unfortunately, there is enough common ground between the Labour Party and the Likud, in the social and economic spheres, and with regard to Oslo, to provide the basis for such a government. * Notes Source: News From Within, January 1997 1. Ha'aretz, 1 January 1997 News From Within is published by The Alternative Information Center Jerusalem-Bethlehem, PO Box 31417, Jerusalem E-Mail: [email protected] • http://www.aic.org • ©: +972-2-241159 and 740585 • Fax: 253151
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Hebron is not the main problem lestal ebian!