ISRAEL: The Struggle of Peres and Rabin

A bitter battle for the Labor Party leadership

G rowing popular dissatisfaction with Prime Minister Menachem Begin's government would seem to present the opposition Labor Party with a golden opportunity. Polls show that Labor would win an absolute majority of seats in the Knesset if elections were held today. Nonetheless, there is a possibility that the party, which ruled Israel from 1948 to 1977, may throw away its big chance to return to power. Reason: it is bogged down in a vindictive leadership battle that Israelis refer to simply as "the struggle."

The intensity of the feud has few parallels in...

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