Peres Named to Fashion New Israeli Government

President Chaim Herzog today named Labor Party leader Shimon Peres as Israel’s prime minister-designate and gave him the difficult task of trying to form a new government.

Israel television broadcast live coverage of Herzog giving a letter of nomination to the 66-year-old Peres, who headed Israel’s government in 1984-86.

Israeli law left Herzog with the authority to choose a candidate for prime minister. Peres has six weeks to form a new ruling coalition, but it was not certain he would be able to bring together his leftist allies and conservative religious factions.

Herzog met over the past two days with leaders of Israel’s two major parties to decide who has the best chance of forming a new governing coalition. A reversal by a key religious faction Monday left Labor and the right-wing Likud at a draw, with 60-60 support in the 120-member Parliament.

The Labor Party is technically Parliament’s largest faction, with 39 legislators.

Caretaker Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir, whose Likud bloc has 35 seats, fell in a parliamentary vote of no confidence last Thursday, triggered by a dispute over Middle East peace moves.

An official in Herzog’s office, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the president’s office has been inundated with phone calls from Israelis complaining that the wheeling and dealing has paralyzed the government.

“People say it is impossible to bear the political situation,” the official said.

Israel radio said Herzog, mirroring these sentiments, told some politicians Monday that “the Israeli public is fed up with politicians.”

The radio said Herzog’s office also received a number of anonymous telephone threats today, including one bomb threat. Police searched and found no explosives, the radio said.

Much of the maneuvering has involved small ultra-Orthodox religious parties, notably the Shas faction whose spiritual leader, 69-year-old Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, caused the fall of Shamir’s Likud-Labor coalition last week.

Yosef said he ordered Shas to withhold support from Shamir because his government was unable to move forward in the peace process.

But he reversed his stand Monday after a talk with his mentor, 92-year-old Rabbi Eliezer Shach, and a scolding from the nation’s two chief rabbis.

In another development, Israel welcomed the idea of peace talks with its most implacable foe, Syria, but said the goal should be an overall peace treaty rather than a proposed demilitarized zone in the occupied Golan Heights.

Former President Jimmy Carter, who met Syrian President Hafez Assad last week, told reporters Sunday that Syria is ready for “bilateral talks with Israel, including the Golan Heights.”