HOREV COMMISSION

HOREV COMMISSION . In December 1975 the Jerusalem Conference on Solidarity for Israel, convened as a result of the un Resolution equating Zionism with racism, decided to set up a commission to "inquire into the whole system involved in immigration and absorption, its institutions and procedures, the coordination between them, and make recommendations as to the steps to be taken to improve the tools and the methods used today on that said system."

The then Prime Minister Yiẓḥak Rabin and the chairman of the Jewish Agency, Mr. Yosef Almogi, appointed Amos Horev as head of the commission – consisting of 10 members – which therewith bore his name, and it began its work in March 1976. After hearing some 90 witnesses, the commission handed its 80-page report to Rabin and Almogi in November.

The main recommendation of the commission was the abolition of both bodies hitherto dealing with aliyah and absorption – the Ministry of Immigrant Absorption and the Aliyah and Absorption Department of the Jewish Agency – and that in their place there be set up a Supreme Council for Aliyah and Absorption headed by the prime minister.

The opposition of both bodies concerned, and the demand by each of them that the other be abolished and immigration and absorption become its sole prerogative, caused the continuous postponement of any action. Only in December 1978, partly as a result of the reshuffle of the cabinet, was it decided to abolish the ministry and hand over the responsibility for the functions concerned to the Jewish Agency. However, this decision has yet to be implemented.