Political Career
In 1965 Aloni was first elected to the Knesset on the list of the Alignment (a merger of Mapai and Ahdut HaAvoda), and subsequently founded the Israel Consumers Council, which she chaired for four years.
She left the Alignment in 1973 and established Ratz (Citizens Rights Movement), a party advocating electoral reform, separation of religion and state and human rights. The party won three Knesset mandates in the 1973 elections. Ratz initially joined the Alignment-led government with Aloni as minister without portfolio but she resigned immediately to protest the appointment to cabinet of Yitzhak Rafael. Ratz briefly became Ya'ad – Civil Rights Movement when independent MK Aryeh Eliav joined the faction, but returned to its original status soon after.
Throughout the 1970s Aloni attempted to create a dialogue with Palestinians in hopes of achieving a lasting peace settlement. During the 1982 Lebanon War she established the "International Center for Peace in the Middle East". In 1984, Ratz aligned with Peace Now and the Left Camp of Israel to increase its size in the Knesset to five mandates. In 1992, she led Ratz into a coalition with Shinui and Mapam to form the new Meretz party, which won 12 seats under her leadership in the elections that year. Aloni became Minister of Education under Yitzhak Rabin but was forced to resign after a year due to her outspoken statements on matters of religion. As Education Minister, she also criticized pilgrimages by Israeli students to Holocaust concentration camps on grounds that such visits were turning Israeli youth into aggressive, nationalistic xenophobes, claiming that students "march with unfurled flags, as if they've come to conquer Poland". She was reappointed Minister of Communications and Science and Culture and served until 1996 when she retired from party politics.
Read more about this topic: Shulamit Aloni
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