Peace Is No. 1 Goal, Shamir Tells Knesset

Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir promised that peace will be the “first and foremost objective” of his new four-year government, but in his opening address to Israel’s Parliament on Thursday, the aging leader gave no hint of new ideas to counter a diplomatic offensive by the Palestine Liberation Organization.

Shamir, 73, who constructed an alliance of his rightist Likud Party with center-left Labor to form a large ruling bloc, repeated familiar peace proposals for direct talks with Arab neighbors and Palestinians who have no links to the PLO.

He also pinpointed once again his intent in wooing Labor into government: to ward off moves from abroad that he considers hostile.

“The developments in the international arena . . . require us to bridge our differences and solve problems together. I make specific reference to the multifaceted political propaganda campaign of the terrorist organizations, their friends and supporters against Israel,” Shamir said, speaking of the PLO.

No Indirect Talks

In a recent move that shocked the Israeli government, the Reagan Administration lifted a 13-year ban on official contact with the PLO. Sources in the Foreign Ministry said that Israel has already informed the United States that not only will it refuse to negotiate with the PLO, it will also not use Washington as a go-between for indirect talks.

“Unfortunately, we have been forced to strongly differ from the last decision of the U.S. Administration concerning the dialogue with the PLO,” Shamir said. “According to our knowledge, (the PLO) has not changed its skin, its habits, its evil charter and the terror that it uses.”

He added that he hopes Washington will change its mind.

After Shamir’s one-hour speech and a six-hour debate, the 120-member Knesset, or Parliament, overwhelmingly confirmed the new government. Many of the newly sworn-in ministers are holdovers from the previous government, which was also anchored by a Likud-Labor alliance. Among them is Shimon Peres, who moves from the Foreign Ministry to Finance and leaves behind his campaign for international peace talks to resolve the Middle East conflict, which Shamir has long opposed.

Peres defended his decision to join his arch-rival for yet another partnership. “We have two opinions, but one land and one future. We will try with our two opinions to serve the same land and its future,” he said.

Peres insisted that he would keep his hand in foreign policy. “Peace is not a matter of a ministry, it is a matter of the government as such,” he told Israel Radio.

Not a few Israeli analysts predicted paralysis for the renewed alliance. “They will go forward like two convicts in leg irons, hobbling painfully. And if hobbling proves too painful, they will just stand still,” wrote a columnist in the pro-Labor Jerusalem Post.

Parties left out of the coalition--minor ones on the left and right--forecast disaster. Shulamit Aloni of the leftist Citizens’ Rights Movement predicted war. Eliazar Waldman of the far-right Tehiya Party warned that the government will eventually permit a Palestinian state to be formed next door to Israel.

“I am very worried about what this government will bring upon us,” Waldman said.

Three religious parties rushed to join the coalition at the last minute--although they accused Shamir of breaking promises made when he was trying to lure them into a narrow coalition of rightist and religious parties. Israeli newspapers reported that the religious parties joined up in order to get funding for religious schools and clinics.

American Jews breathed a sigh of relief that the religious parties, all of them Orthodox or ultra-Orthodox, will have reduced influence in the broad government, which will not stand or fall on their votes. These parties had pressed Shamir for passage of a law that would make Jewish conversions valid only if performed by Orthodox rabbis.

American Jewry viewed the so-called “who is a Jew” legislation as a slap at Reform and Conservative congregations, which are predominant in the United States.

“We think that problem is gone,” said Harry Wall, a representative of the Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith.

In recent weeks, numerous Jewish leaders from the United States trooped to Jerusalem to oppose the measure and hinted that offended American Jews would reduce their political and financial support for Israel if it passed.