Peres Says He Has Enough Support to Form a New Israeli Government : Politics: One party defector could make the difference. No identities were disclosed.

Shimon Peres, the Labor Party leader who has promised to take Israel into peace talks with Palestinians, said Wednesday that he has acquired enough parliamentary support to become prime minister.

The identity of the lawmaker or lawmakers who may have changed party loyalty and come to Peres’ support was not made public. Since the Likud-Labor coalition government collapsed March 15, Peres has been trying to persuade Likud Party members to defect.

Newspapers, speculating on the identity of one possible defector, said he would be given a police escort into the Knesset, the Israeli Parliament.

On Wednesday afternoon, Peres sent a letter to President Chaim Herzog informing him that he will name a Cabinet and submit it for approval as soon as the Knesset can be convened. When that might be was not clear; many members have gone abroad on vacation.

“I have the honor to inform you that I have succeeded in forming a government,” Peres told Herzog.

Later, Peres told reporters: “We have to accomplish a new government as soon as possible. . . .

“It is unthinkable that a democratic country would remain without a proper government, a legal government, a full government, for weeks and weeks when we are facing important waves of immigration, when we have security problems, economic problems and most of the ministries are without ministers.

“I say we have a majority. I will say no more than that. Negotiations are not complete, and I hope there is a chance to broaden further support for the government I shall build.”

Peres said he hopes the Knesset will meet Sunday. He declined to name the members of his Cabinet but said his government will “move forward the peace process.”

Likud leaders were reportedly shocked. Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir was quoted by government television as saying that “we did everything to keep the government intact.”

Since the crisis erupted with the coalition’s collapse, Shamir has headed a rump government in a caretaker role. When Labor pulled out, what had been a national unity government was left with only about half its Cabinet ministers.

Peres was given approval to form a new government, but he had not been able to line up the support of more than 60 of the Knesset’s 120 members--one short of a majority. Labor, a center-left party, has 39 seats of its own. Likud has 40, and the rest are scattered across the political landscape.

No one has said who it might have been that put Peres over the top, but attention focused on two breakaway members of Likud, Yitzhak Modai and Avraham Sharir.

Likud, in a move that touched off a storm of public criticism, said it had $2.5 million in pledges to keep defectors in the fold. According to government television, the money was to be donated by an unidentified Jewish-American millionaire.

The money was meant to ensure that Shamir would keep promises of Cabinet posts and high party posts for the two Likud members, according to news reports. In the event that he failed to keep his word, the money was to go to a new party headed by Modai and Sharir.

Sharir is said to be keen on joining Peres. According to acquaintances, he holds a grudge against Shamir for denying him a Cabinet post in the last government and views his future in Likud as bleak. Sharir, who was minister of tourism in a previous coalition, refused to answer reporters’ questions Wednesday night.

Some Likud members said Peres is bluffing and has no majority.

“I don’t believe him,” said Moshe Katzav, a Likud member and minister of transportation. “I don’t trust him. He has no more than 60.”

Katzav said Modai was meeting with Shamir even as he spoke.

Peres’ announcement raised a number of questions besides the identity of his supporters. For one thing, leftist parties that had been expected to support him were apparently having second thoughts.

“We’re not in his pocket,” said Dedi Zucker, a member of the leftist Citizens Rights Movement.

According to an unconfirmed report, Peres’ announcement was a cover for an attempt to form a minority government. It was said that he would persuade a member of an unaligned religious party to sit out the Knesset vote, a maneuver that would give Peres a 60-59 plurality.

Yitzhak Rabin, the former defense minister and No. 2 in Labor, was uncharacteristically silent. Rabin, who resisted Peres’ move to break up the coalition government, refused to talk with reporters.

For Peres, heading a new government would constitute a dramatic recovery from the edge of obscurity. After failing to lead Labor to victory in the last elections, he joined the Shamir government as minister of finance. At the time, many analysts forecast his eventual ouster from party leadership and the end of a long career.

But Peres, who was prime minister from 1984 to 1986, continued to take an active diplomatic role. He spearheaded Labor’s insistence that Israel begin peace talks under a plan brokered by U.S. Secretary of State James A. Baker III. When Shamir balked, Peres engineered a no-confidence vote in the Knesset.

During his term in the Finance Ministry, Peres courted religious parties with generous funding, and it paid off in one important instance: The ultra-Orthodox Agudat Israel party backed Peres in his quest for a majority, giving him an important edge.

The horse-trading process is distasteful to many Israelis. A movement is afoot to reform the electoral system to reduce the role of minor parties. A small group of hunger strikers have camped out near the Knesset building, trying to persuade thousands of citizens to sign a petition asking for change.