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Israel's Knesset Speaker Promises Peres Party President: Paper
Israel's Knesset (parliament) Speaker Avraham Burg has promised to nominate Foreign Minister Shimon Peres party president if he wins in Tuesday's Labor Party primaries, Israeli Ha'aretz daily reported Sunday.
The report said that Burg's campaign staff has formulated a proposal entitled "President of the Labor Party - a definition of the post and its objectives."
In the proposal, Burg, one of the two candidates to compete in the party primaries, would nominate Peres, former party leader and prime minister, as the party's president at the party's meeting next autumn.
As president, Peres would head a "Forum for the Future" team to mastermind long-term goals for the party, working with experts and party colleagues in various spheres.
Analysts pointed out that the move to create the new role in the party was aiming to muster Peres' support for Burg in the primaries, in which more than 110,000 Israeli Laborites will vote for their new party leader.
Burg's only contender is Israeli Defense Minister Binyamin Ben Eliezer.
After former Labor party leader and prime minister Ehud Barak announced resignation after his election defeat last February, Peres played a role as interim party leader. He has not yet announced his preferable candidate in the current campaign leading to the primaries.
However, Burg admitted that Peres was his political mentor and his president proposal may be a ploy to persuade party voters that Peres is on his side.
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