A Homemade Rebellion

Seeking better working conditions, employees at a government desalination plant in Eilat recently tried a novel approach. They stayed on the job until they were so tired that they could no longer obey orders. The sleep-in failed, but it did focus attention on a brewing crisis in Israel. There have been so many strikes and demonstrations in the past few months that Premier Golda Meir has warned: "The situation is deteriorating into a rebellion, not by the Arabs but by our own hands."

Peace, or at least a cease-fire that has endured for 15 months, is behind Israel's problems. Beguiled by safety, Israeli wage earners at all levels are demanding pay increases in order to meet higher taxes and spiraling living costs (an 11% increase so far this year). Postal workers deliver the mail at a snail's pace. Grocers recently struck to protest Israel's 20% devaluation in the wake of U.S. economic moves. Customs inspectors have disrupted the export-import trade with brief but frequent strikes. Even hospital staffs and lifeguards have walked off their jobs temporarily. Lost work days were few compared to other nations, but the strikes were highly visible.

Pure Hooliganism. The strike that most angered the Labor Party government, however, was a walkout last month by 800 workers at Lod airport. The walkout shut Israel's only international airport, diverted jets to Cyprus and Greece, stranded 1,000 passengers and brought a charge of "pure hooliganism" from Mrs. Meir. Since Lod, leaders of the government, the opposition and labor unions have been meeting to work out tighter laws covering wildcat strikes and walkouts by public employees. Last week, however, their discussions were still stalemated.

Mrs. Meir and her government are blamed for much of the difficulty. Says Hebrew University Sociologist Chaim Adler: "The people who have to make the decisions in Israel have had all their time, effort and energies taken up with war and international affairs. In peacetime we are discovering that poverty, discrimination, religious friction and labor unrest can be as divisive to our nation as the Hebrew language and the threat of war can be unifying."

The internal problems seem endless. A substantial group of people still live below the poverty level. Religious differences have been papered over but hardly solved. Orthodox newspapers regularly preach against licentiousness and warn of a crisis in faith and morals. Israeli doctors recently carried out a two-hour work stoppage because extremists were daubing the homes and cars of pathologists with obscenities; the Orthodox object to autopsies, which are proscribed on religious grounds.

Chief Rival. These domestic difficulties may well lead to a political crisis. The defense-minded country is living beyond its means. Preparing the 1972 budget, Finance Minister Pinhas Sapir demanded a $476 million cut from this year's $3.1 billion figure. He called for a 16% reduction in defense spending, which accounts for 40% of the budget, and threatened to resign unless the cut is carried out.

The Finance Minister's demands placed him on a collision course with Defense Minister Moshe Dayan, Sapir's chief rival to succeed Golda Meir. The Premier is now 73; she might step down suddenly or retire after 1973's national elections. Dayan, too, warned that he would resign if his budget is so crippled that he cannot ensure public security. If either should resign, that would touch off a Cabinet crisis that would make Israel's peacetime problems even more severe.

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