Seventh Government of Israel

Ben-Gurion combined the offices of prime minister and defense minister in the Seventh Government, placing both political leadership and the defense portfolio in his hands.[5] The coalition included Mapai, Mapam, Ahdut HaAvoda–Poalei Zion, the religious parties represented by the National Religious Front, and the Progressives.[2] It had the support of 90 Knesset members, with a cabinet of 16 ministers and three deputy ministers.[6]

The government’s published program joined national development to social integration: it prioritized immigration from countries of distress, economic independence, employment, education, science, and settlement in sparsely populated northern and southern areas.[4] Security and peaceful relations were also declared objectives, while coalition members undertook to share responsibility for agreed policies and government decisions.[4] That commitment to collective responsibility became central to the dispute that ended the government’s tenure.[7]

The election to the Third Knesset took place on July 26, 1955, and the new Knesset first met on August 15.[2] Mapai emerged with 40 seats, followed by Herut with 15 and the General Zionists with 13.[3] The National Religious Front won 11 seats, Ahdut HaAvoda 10, Mapam nine, and the Progressive Party five; three minority lists associated with Mapai held another five seats.[3][2]

Ben-Gurion had already returned to government as defense minister in February 1955, replacing Pinhas Lavon while Moshe Sharett remained prime minister.[8] His return to the premiership followed Sharett’s period in office from January 1954 to November 1955.[9] The Uri Ilan affair, the Lavon affair, and the Maaleh Akrabim massacre formed part of the security and political setting of Sharett’s premiership.[9]

President Yitzhak Ben-Zvi tasked Ben-Gurion with forming a government on August 18, 1955.[4] In his subsequent presentation to the Knesset, Ben-Gurion said that he completed his proposal on October 7 after seven weeks of negotiations with individual parties and groups of parties.[4] The broader interval between the election and the government’s formation lasted about three months.[2]

Ben-Gurion approached all seven parties in the outgoing provisional government, but the General Zionists declined negotiations on the basis of his proposed program, and he rejected demands from Agudat Israel.[4] Five party groupings participated in drafting the guidelines: Mapam, Ahdut HaAvoda–Poalei Zion, Hapoel Hamizrachi and Mizrachi, the Progressives, and Mapai.[4] The resulting coalition brought all three labor parties into government together for the first time.[2]

On November 2, Ben-Gurion presented the proposed cabinet and its policy guidelines to the Knesset and requested a vote of confidence.[4] The government’s official term began on November 3, 1955.[1]

The initial cabinet paired Ben-Gurion’s premiership and defense portfolio with Moshe Sharett at foreign affairs, Levi Eshkol at finance, and Golda Meir at labor.[5] Zalman Aranne held education and culture; Israel Barzilai, health; Israel Bar-Yehuda, interior; Mordechai Bentov, development; Yosef Burg, posts; and Moshe Carmel, transport.[5]

The remaining ministers were Kadish Luz at agriculture, Pinhas Rosen at justice, Pinhas Sapir at trade and industry, Behor Shalom Shitrit at police, and Moshe Shapira at religious affairs and welfare.[5] Peretz Naftali served without portfolio.[5]

In June 1956, Sharett left the foreign affairs portfolio and Meir succeeded him; Mordechai Namir then took over the labor ministry.[2] The change followed disagreements between Sharett and Ben-Gurion over the coordination of defense and foreign policy.[2] Sharett opposed reprisal operations in part because of their potential effects on Israel’s standing at the United Nations, whereas Ben-Gurion favored a more activist approach to security policy.[10]

Dispersing population and industry beyond the central coastal region was a principal feature of the government’s development program.[4] Its guidelines proposed incentives for productive private investment, agricultural settlement, industrial development, and the expansion of fishing and shipping.[4] They also called for developing Eilat as a port city and establishing settlements along the routes leading to it.[4]

Water development was linked to the same southward orientation.[4] The program called for directing water resources south, completing the Yarkon project, and undertaking the first stage of diverting Jordan River water.[4] In his 1957 text “Daruma” (“Southward”), Ben-Gurion argued that settlement and development of the Negev were essential to Israel’s future, declaring: “If the state does not eliminate the desert, the desert may eliminate the state.”[1]

The coalition guidelines acknowledged substantial social and cultural differences between many new immigrants and established residents and warned of danger if the material and spiritual gap persisted.[4] Proposed remedies included eliminating the ma’abarot, or transit camps, and slum neighborhoods, expanding vocational education, and providing productive employment.[4] Young people were encouraged to assist immigrant communities through work, security, and cultural and social activities.[4]

Education policy also included an emphasis on Jewish identity and connections with world Jewry.[11] Four days after the government was formed, Ben-Gurion wrote to Education Minister Zalman Aran about a clause in the policy guidelines, arguing that young people needed stronger Jewish consciousness, greater knowledge of Jewish historical heritage, and a moral connection to Jews worldwide.[11] Aran began addressing the subject through a public committee.[11]

The published guidelines promised Arabs and other minorities the civil rights and civic duties of other citizens, with state and local services available without distinction of race or religion.[1] They provided for Arabic-language education alongside required Hebrew study, access to higher education, and scholarships for qualifying minority students.[1] A special committee was also proposed to examine possibilities for reducing the scope and operation of military administration in border areas.[1]

When presenting the government’s program, Ben-Gurion emphasized fedayeen infiltrations from the Gaza Strip and Egypt’s arms agreement with Czechoslovakia, concluded with Soviet backing.[2] Czechoslovakia had previously supplied Israel with arms during the War of Independence, also with Soviet backing.[2] By 1955, Egyptian authorities in Gaza had taken over the training and operational control of fedayeen raids against Negev villages.[12]

Relations with the United Nations remained bound up with border security and the operation of the armistice agreements.[12] In a Knesset statement on June 19, 1956, following Secretary-General Dag Hammarskjold’s mission, Ben-Gurion argued that each armistice agreement constituted a “single unit” that Israel would observe in its entirety if the other side did the same.[12]

Israel, Britain, and France conducted secret talks at Sèvres during the 1956 Suez Crisis.[13] The Israeli delegation included Ben-Gurion, Chief of Staff Moshe Dayan, and Shimon Peres.[13] A document signed on October 24 provided for Israeli forces to invade Sinai on October 29 and advance toward the Suez Canal, followed by an Anglo-French ultimatum to Israel and Egypt.[13]

The Sinai Campaign began on October 29, 1956, with Israel operating in cooperation with Britain and France.[2] Mapam opposed the operation but remained in the cabinet.[2] Historian Benny Morris characterizes the campaign as both retaliatory and preemptive, connecting Ben-Gurion’s decision to Egypt’s acquisition of modern Soviet-made heavy weapons.[14]

International pressure subsequently led Ben-Gurion to agree to withdraw Israeli forces from Sinai, the Gaza Strip, and Sharm el-Sheikh.[2] The withdrawal from Sinai and Gaza took place in March 1957.[15] A United Nations Emergency Force was deployed on the Egyptian side of the armistice line and at Sharm el-Sheikh, with the general objective of deterring fedayeen raids from Gaza and interference with passage through the Strait of Tiran and Gulf of Aqaba.[12] Efforts by Hammarskjold to ease Egypt’s Suez Canal blockade measures were unsuccessful.[12]

On the eve of the campaign, border policemen shot dead 49 Arab villagers at Kafr Kassem after they broke a curfew of which they had not been informed.[2] Those responsible were tried and received lengthy prison sentences, later reduced.[2] Ben-Gurion described the killings as a blow to “the most sacred principles of human morality.”[2]

The Eisenhower Doctrine produced a coalition dispute in 1957 over Israel’s relationship with the United States.[2] The doctrine called for American assistance to countries threatened by Communist aggression.[2] Mapam and Ahdut HaAvoda opposed adopting a pro-American stance, citing their preference for neutrality and concern about the consequences for Jews seeking to leave the Soviet Union.[2]

When the issue came before the Knesset on June 3, the two parties abstained rather than voting against the government.[2] Herut and the General Zionists also abstained, but for the opposite reason: they wanted stronger Israeli support for American policy.[2]

On October 28, 1957, the Knesset reelected Yitzhak Ben-Zvi to a second presidential term.[2] The following day, a person threw a hand grenade into the Knesset plenary hall, wounding Ben-Gurion and several ministers.[2]

A further coalition crisis developed in December after reports that Dayan had visited West Germany to discuss arms purchases.[2] Pressure from Ahdut HaAvoda and Mapam brought the proposed plan to an end, and Ben-Gurion tendered his resignation on December 31.[2] In his January 7, 1958, address to the Knesset, Ben-Gurion explained that he had resigned after the government judged Ahdut HaAvoda’s publication of a secret decision to be damaging to the state and a serious breach of collective responsibility.[7]

The succeeding government had the same party composition.[2] Its formation followed renewed commitments by the participating parties to collective responsibility and confidentiality in discussions of foreign affairs and security.[7] The Seventh Government’s formal tenure ended on January 7, 1958.[1]

The inclusion of all three labor parties distinguished the coalition, but did not eliminate disagreements over military action, international alignment, or ministerial discipline.[2] Mapam’s decision to remain in government despite opposing the Sinai Campaign and the left-wing parties’ abstentions over the Eisenhower Doctrine allowed the coalition to continue through major policy disputes.[2] Its eventual replacement by a government with the same party composition placed renewed emphasis on the rules governing collective cabinet responsibility.[2][7]

Alongside those security and diplomatic issues, the government articulated a domestic program encompassing immigrant integration, regional development, water infrastructure, educational advancement, and scientific research.[4] Its commitments to minority rights and a review of military administration were expressed as policy guidelines, rather than as a record of completed implementation.[1]

The politically charged 1955 election atmosphere included the Kastner libel trial and scrutiny of Mapai’s conduct and Rudolf Kastner’s wartime rescue efforts.[3] The trial judge ruled that Kastner had collaborated with the Nazis and used the phrase “sold his soul to the devil”; Kastner appealed and was shot in March 1957, dying in hospital about ten days later.[3] The ruling and the trial’s treatment of Kastner remained politically and historically disputed.[3]

Participants in the Sèvres talks later differed over whether their secret agreement constituted collusion.[13] Within Israel, Herut condemned the subsequent withdrawal as defeatist and as squandering military gains.[2] The resignation crisis also generated competing political accounts in the Knesset, where Ben-Gurion’s explanation of the disclosure and its consequences was challenged.[7]