Premier Golda Meir of Israel announced her resignation, bringing down her month-old coalition government and setting the stage for new elections in the next several months. Mrs. Meir said she had found it impossible to continue because of deep divisions within her Labor party over the issue of assigning responsibility for Israel’s military shortcomings at the beginning of the October war. Mrs. Meir and her cabinet will operate on a caretaker basis until a new government is formed later on. Meir announced her resignation as Premier and as leader of the Israeli Labor Party, nine days after the release of the Agranat Commission report. Meir’s decision came after a meeting of the 51 members of her Alignment party coalition, when she told reporters “I’ve had enough.” Her colleague, Yitzhak Aharon, then told the group “The prime minister has announced her resignation.” Rather than schedule new elections, the Israeli Labor Party announced on April 21 that they would try to form a new government of ministers.
Diplomats and administration officials in Washington said they expected the United States to continue its efforts for an Israeli-Syrian disengagement agreement despite Mrs. Meir’s resignation. Though warning that her resignation could cause problems, the experts expressed confidence that a caretaker government headed by Mrs. Meir would be able to negotiate an accord.
Syria said today that Israeli shells nearly hit the new commander of United Nations truce observers in the Middle East. A Syrian spokesman said Lieutenant General Bengt Lilgentrand of Norway, who took over April 1, was crossing the cease‐fire line in the Golan Heights when Israel launched a surprise attack. United Nations sources confirmed that the general came under fire near the United Nations position at Kanakir but said the shells landed about 200 yards away. The Syrian spokesman had said a shell hit within a few dozen yards. “This is not the first time Israel has committed aggression against U.N. observers whose positions it is fully aware of,” a Syrian statement said.
Israel’s Ambassador to the United States said today that it was “senseless” for Syria to attempt to justify the continuing shelling in the Golan Heights with “the assertion that Israel is establishing settlements in that area.” The Ambassador, Simcha Dinitz, was replying to an assertion by Syria’s representative in Washington that Israel was attempting to fortify and settle the Golan Heights region. The Syrian, Sabah Kabani, made the assertion Monday in an interview with The New York Times. In the interview, Mr. Kabani said that Syrian artillery was shelling Israeli positions, and would continue to do so, because Israel was fortifying the area. Today, Mr. Dinitz said in an interview that his government’s proposal for disengagement of forces on the Syrian front was designed to make “resumption of hostilities less probable” and “shooting less feasible” in the Golan Heights.
Britain and Iraq re-established diplomatic relations, the Iraqi news agency reported. Iraq broke off relations in late 1971, accusing Britain of collusion with Iran in the seizure of three small islands near the entrance to the Persian Gulf. Iran occupied the islands after Britain withdrew its military from the gulf.
Akbar Etemad, known for founding Iran’s nuclear energy and weapons program, was appointed as the first president of the new Atomic Energy Organization of Iran and given an additional post as Deputy Prime Minister.
Communist troops smashed through two Cambodian government positions southeast of Phnom Penh, sending about 300 government soldiers fleeing to positions less than six miles from the center of the capital.
About 150 North Vietnamese and Pathet Lao soldiers have made a series of attacks along a strategic highway in southern Laos, sources in this capital said today. It was the first cease‐fire violation reported since the Pathet Lao joined a coalition Government with the rightists and neutralists in Vientiane Friday. The sources said the first attack came Sunday along a stretch of Route 13 about 250 miles southeast of Vientiane and several miles inland from the Mekong River border with Thailand. Fighting was reported continuing today.
Defense Minister Sisouk na Champassak of the Vientiane faction protested the attack to the Pathet Lao today at the first meeting of the new coalition Cabinet, the sources reported. The sources said the defense minister asked the coalition Cabinet to send an inspection team to the battle area, and Economy Minister Sot Petrasy, the senior Pathet Lao representative, said he would consider the request. The Communist troops were said to have forced a government unit out of a position 30 miles north of a large army base at Seno, in the southern panhandle. Today an army position near the Se Bang Fai river was reported attacked.
Soviet naval and air forces appear to be embarking on a major exercise in the Atlantic Ocean, Western defense sources said in London. Extra Russian intelligence-gathering vessels are on station in the Eastern Atlantic and a guided-missile destroyer is patrolling west of Scotland’s Shetland Isles, the sources said. Long-range Soviet reconnaissance aircraft also were reported over the Norwegian Sea.
The second-largest French labor union has endorsed Francois Mitterrand, the lone candidate of the political Left in the nation’s presidential campaign. The unsolicited move by the French Democratic Confederation of Labor, which has never before endorsed a leftist candidate for the presidency, is a major worry to the Gaullist-led government coalition. Since the lively, 700,000-member union is largely Roman Catholic, the government is afraid other traditionally centrist Catholics may be swayed by the endorsement to vote for Mr. Mitterrand.
Liberal Gaullist leader Edgar Faure’s formal withdrawal from the French presidential race cleared the way for a direct clash between the two archrivals of the Gaullist-led government majority: former Premier Jacques Chaban-Delmas and Finance Minister Valery Giscard d’Estaing. Since it is almost certain that their Socialist opponent, party chief Francois Mitterrand, will top the poll first time around, the fight between the two Gaullists becomes one for second place. Only the two top finishers in round No. 1, on May 5, will qualify for the crucial runoff two weeks later.
Gunmen burst into a Northern Ireland primary school near the Irish border during classes and killed the Protestant principal, police said in Belfast. They said the shooting had the markings of an Irish Republican Army assassination. The body of George Saunderson, a retired military officer, was found in the kitchen of the school at Derrylin, a village about one mile from the frontier.
Pope Paul VI called for peace in the Middle East and urged that the holy places of Jerusalem be placed under international jurisdiction. He also called for a just settlement of the refugee problem there. The 76year-old Pontiff spoke to a crowd of 10,000 in the Vatican and appeared fully recovered from two bouts of illness last month.
Soviet trade with capitalist nations rose more than 40 percent last year, according to figures released by Moscow, which indicated that for the first time the West accounted for more than a quarter of Soviet international trade. By the Soviet accounting, American trade more than doubled to $1.56 billion in 1973.
Groups of Americans concerned with the plight of Soviet Jews appealed to Congress to withhold trade concessions from the Soviet Union until Soviet citizens are allowed to emigrate freely. One representative, Sister Margaret Ellen Traxler, said in Washington: “In the age after Auschwitz, we as Christians are not going to stand by and allow Jews to be persecuted, intimidated or deprived of their rights in any country.”
Australia’s Prime Minister, Gough Whitlam, announced that he had asked the Governor-General to dissolve the Australian House of Representatives and to schedule new elections at the same time as an already-scheduled Senate election. Whitlam’s request for a “double dissolution” came hours after the Australian Senate refused to approve a $170 million spending bill to prevent the government from shutting down. After the announcement of double dissolution, the Senate approved further government funding.
Ethiopian Prime Minister Endalkachew Makonnen was snubbed by a turbulent parliament while widespread strikes hit hospitals, schools, transport and garbage disposal operations across the country, Parliament which erupted into desk banging and shouting when Endalkachew prepared to speak on plans for reform, set up a committee to prepare questions for him on the nation’s social, economic and political situation.
The Commissioner of Internal Revenue has asked for a grand jury investigation into a possible criminal conspiracy stemming from President Nixon’s claim of a $576,000 tax deduction for his vice-presidential papers, according to well-placed sources. The sources said that Donald Alexander had discussed the matter with Leon Jaworski, the special Watergate prosecutor, last week and given him a list of former presidential associates to be investigated.
Republican members of the House Judiciary Committee warned the White House that the committee was virtually certain to issue a subpoena today if there has been no concession to the committee’s long-standing request for certain White House documents and recordings.
Former Attorney General John Mitchell testified in his own defense, swearing that he never tried to fix or impede a federal investigation in return for a contribution to President Nixon’s re-election campaign. Appearing calm and self-assured, Mr. Mitchell directly refuted the testimony of four government witnesses, including John Dean. Mr. Mitchell, who will continue on the stand when the trial resumes Monday after a postponement, is expected to be followed by his co-defendant, former Commerce Secretary Maurice Stans.
The Senate, struggling unsuccessfully to complete action on a major campaign reform bill, voted today to tighten restrictions on private contributions to Federal election campaigns. By a vote of 64 to 24, the Senate agreed to limit told contributions that a candidate for President or Congress could receive during an entire election year to $3,000 from an individual and $6,000 from an organization. Under the original terms of the campaign bill, which has been debated in the Senate since March 26, individuals could have contributed up to $3,000 each to any candidate’s primary election, primary runoff and general election campaigns, or up to a total of $9,000 over the entire election year.
Senator Sam J. Ervin Jr. and a Defense Department official sharply disagreed today over the need for legislation to prevent a recurrence of military spying on civilians, a practice that resulted in the compiling of military files on am estimated 100,000 Americans in the late nineteen‐sixties. The disagreement came on the second and final day of hearings before the Senate Subcommittee on Constitutional Rights, which is headed by Senator Ervin. The subcommittee is considering a bill, introduced by the North Carolina Democrat and co‐sponsored by 34 other Senators, to prohibit military surveillance and the gathering of information on “the beliefs, associations or political activities” of anyone not in the armed forces. Such spying would be punished if the bill becomes law, by a $10,000 fine and two years in jail. The Defense Department ended its widespread civilian surveillance operation with a directive in March, 1971, from Melvin R. Laird, then the Secretary of Defense.
Rep. Otto E. Passman (D-Louisiana) said in a House speech that he had relayed to the White House an offer by a group of businessmen to pay President Nixon $1 million for his vice-presidential papers. He said the group consisted of Democrats as well as Republicans and that the men had hoped to form a syndicate to publish the papers either in book or article form. He refused to identify the men. There has been no formal determination yet as to whether the papers still belong to Mr. Nixon or actually belong to the National Archives as a presidential gift.
Russell E. Train, administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, became ensnarled in apparent contradictions today as he attempted to explain to a Senate subcommittee why he had reversed the agency’s policy against filing statements on the impact its regulatory activities have upon the environment. William D, Ruckelshaus, Mr. Train’s predecessor, had always maintained that, unlike Federal agencies whose activities had an environmental impact, EPA did not have to file impact statements under the National Environmental Policy Act because it was engaged in environmental protection. But today, Mr. Train told the Senate Subcommittee on Environmental Pollution that his agency had now decided to prepare such statements on many of its activities “voluntarily” and circulate them, as the Environmental Policy Act requires, to other agencies for comment.
Final arguments were completed in the murder trial in Media, Pennsylvania of former United Mine Workers President W. A. (Tony) Boyle, accused of masterminding the assassination of union rival Joseph A. Yablonski. The case is scheduled to go to the jury today after a charge by Judge Francis Catania, who earlier turned down a defense motion for a directed verdict of acquittal. Yablonski and his wife and daughter were killed on December 31, 1969.
The House passed and sent to the Senate an $8.8 billion supplemental appropriation bill after tacking on an extra $154.5 million to create more jobs and fight child abuse. No effort was made to cut or increase any of the bill’s $6.2 billion for defense. The House approved an amendment for $150 million, which sponsor Rep. David R. Obey (D-Wisconsin) said would create an extra 15,000 public service jobs for a total of about 100,000. The $4.5 million to combat child abuse was approved to fund a special demonstration project.
Governor Wilson has indicated that New York state will not meet an April 15 federal deadline to agree on a plan to clean up New York City’s air, thus raising the possibility that the federal government will impose its own plan on the state. In a letter to the head of the Environmental Protection Agency, Mr. Wilson said the state could not implement federal air quality standards for transportation in New York City before the government provided $200 million in aid for mass transportation in New York and also took a variety of other steps.
Georgia health officials said a preliminary check showed there was no danger to passengers aboard two flights where radiation leaked from improperly shielded shipments. Workmen who might have come in contact with the shipment, however, were still being tested. According to the Federal Aviation Administration, 32 curies of solid iridium 192 was shipped aboard two Delta Air Lines flights Flight 311 from Washington to Atlanta on April 5 and Flight 585 from Atlanta to Baton Rouge on April 6. Delta said 325 persons might have been exposed to radiation, 158 of them passengers and the rest crew members and airline employees.
Chicago’s chief court clerk, Matt Danaher, a protege of Mayor Richard J. Daley, was indicted by a federal grand jury on charges connected with an alleged payoff scheme to secure loans from a savings institution. Three indictments totaling 25 counts also named John P. Hyland, Danaher’s brother-in-law and former board member of the Evergreen Savings & Loan Assn., and Walter Z. Gusich, personnel director for the Circuit Court. One of the counts accused Danaher and Hyland of receiving $400,000 in exchange for their influence in the consideration of about $3.6 million in loans.
Nine former Grumman Aerospace Corp. employees and seven officers of firms that did work for Grumman, of Bethpage, New York, have pleaded guilty to a kickback scheme involving Navy subcontracts, U.S. Attorney Edward J. Boyd announced in New York City. Boyd said the employees took between $400,000 and $500,000 in kickbacks during the last four years from firms that wrote technical manuals for Navy aircraft projects at Grumman. The case grew out of an anonymous telephone tip last July and Boyd said a subsequent FBI investigation found indications of similar payoff schemes elsewhere in the defense industry.
Magicians Penn Jillette and Teller first meet.
In the home opener at Cleveland — yesterday’s game was called off because of snow — Don Money belts a 9th inning grand slam, off Cecil Upshaw, and Milwaukee holds on for a 6-4 win. Oscar Gamble’s wife Juanita sings the National Anthem.
After a number of snowouts, the Expos finally open their season with an epic 11–8 win over the Pirates. Trailing 6–5 heading in the top of the 9th, Montreal scores three runs off Dave Giusti, but Bob Robertson hits a two-run pinch homer off Chuck Taylor to tie the game with two outs in the bottom of the 9th. The Expos manage to score three runs off a tiring Ramon Hernandez in the 13th, with a double by rookie second baseman Jim Cox driving in the go-ahead run. Taylor is still on the mound to pitch the bottom of the 13th, his sixth inning of relief, and he sets down the Bucs in order to earn the win.
Dow Jones Industrial Average: 843.71 (-3.13, -0.37%).
Born:
Eric Greitens, U.S. politician who served as Governor Missouri for 16 months in 2017 and 2018 before resigning in disgrace; in St. Louis, Missouri.
Brandon Noble, NFL defensive tackle (Dallas Cowboys, Washington Redskins), in San Rafael, California.
Scott Bentley, NFL kicker (Denver Broncos, Atlanta Falcons, Kansas City Chiefs, Washington Redskins), in Dallas, Texas.
Dan Trebil, NHL defenseman (Mighty Ducks of Anaheim, Pittsburgh Penguins, St. Louis Blues), in Bloomington, Minnesota.
Helen Jane Long, British pianist and contemporary classical and film score composer (“Embers”; “Vessel of Light”), in Hampshire, England, United Kingdom.
Died:
Patricia Collinge, Irish-born American stage and film actress; in Dublin, Ireland.
History Diaries 