The Labor Party entered into an alliance with Mapam on 28 January 1969. The Alignment name was still well-known, and was re-used for the new alliance. At the time, the Labor Party held 55 seats, and Mapam eight, giving the new Alignment a majority of 63 seats in the 120-seat Knesset. When Levi Eshkol died on 26 February 1969, he was succeeded by
Golda Meir, Israel's first, and so far only, female
Prime Minister, making Israel one of the first countries in the world to have a woman heading the government. The country's success in the
Six-Day War helped the party's popularity, and led to its comprehensive victory in the
1969 elections. Although it lost its majority, the 46.2% of the vote and 56 seats was (and remains) the best electoral performance in Israeli political history. Meir continued with a national unity government including Gahal, the
National Religious Party (Mafdal), the
Independent Liberals,
Progress and Development and
Cooperation and Brotherhood until 1970 when Gahal resigned after the government had decided in principle to adopt the
Rogers Plan, though ultimately they decided against it. During the Knesset session, the party gained one seat as
Meir Avizohar defected from the National List.
1970s The seventh Knesset also covered the event that played a major part in the party's downfall. On 6 October 1973, as Israelis were observing
Yom Kippur, a surprise attack was launched by
Egypt and
Syria, resulting in the
Yom Kippur War. Although Israel later recovered the ground initially lost, the war was generally considered to be a failure, and the government faced significant criticism. The
Agranat Commission was set up to examine the circumstances that led to the war. Before the commission could publish its results, an election was held. Anger at the government was not significantly noticeable, as the Alignment still won 39.6% of the vote and 51 seats. More significantly, the new major right-wing party,
Likud, won 39 seats, and was now breathing down the Alignment's neck. Meir formed a coalition with the National Religious Party and the Independent Liberals. However, ten days after the Agranat Commission published its findings on 1 April 1974, Meir resigned, despite the report clearing her and her
Defence Minister,
Moshe Dayan, of all responsibility.
Yitzhak Rabin took over the Labor Party, beating
Shimon Peres in a leadership contest. This battle led to a long-term falling out between the two, after Rabin described Peres as an "indefatigable intriguer" in his autobiography. Rabin formed a new government with
Ratz, the Independent Liberals, Progress and Development and the
Arab List for Bedouins and Villagers, another Israeli Arab party associated with the Alignment. The National Religious Party joined the coalition soon after, though their arrival precipitated the departure of secularist Ratz. The party's internal divisions were also beginning to show. Mapam broke away, as did Progress and Development and the Arab List for Bedouins and Villagers, who had both come under the Alignment umbrella during Rabin's tenure. Although Mapam returned to the fold shortly afterward, the two Arab parties permanently broke their ties with Alignment. Instead, they created the
United Arab List. Two other MKs,
Aryeh Eliav and
Mordechai Ben-Porat, also left the party. Eliav went on to form
Ya'ad – Civil Rights Movement and then the
Independent Socialist Faction, and Ben-Porat remained an independent MK. In 1976 the Alignment government was hit by the
Yadlin affair regarding illegitimate financial transactions by senior members of the party, notably
Asher Yadlin and
Avraham Ofer. The following year Rabin fell victim to a double scandal, when it was revealed his wife,
Leah had a foreign currency bank account, illegal in Israel at the time; the episode becoming known as the
Dollar Account affair. He also took responsibility for an apparent breach of the
Sabbath on an
Israeli Air Force base. Rabin resigned over the former incident, and Peres took over as prime minister just a short time before the next elections. Shortly before the election, the Alignment party suffered another major blow when Rabin announced that US President Jimmy Carter supported the Israeli idea of defensive borders. Peres led the party into the
1977 elections, which proved to be a historical turning point in Israeli political history: For the first time the left-wing were defeated. The Alignment won only 24.6% of the vote, a decrease of over a third, and picked up just 32 seats. In contrast,
Menachem Begin's Likud won 43 seats. Begin was able to form a right-wing coalition with
Shlomtzion (which quickly merged into Likud), the
National Religious Party,
Agudat Israel, and
Dash. Even after Dash disintegrated, Begin still held a majority. Although the disastrous Yom Kippur War was a factor in the party's heavy defeat, allegations of corruption and
nepotism (highlighted by the various scandals) and anger at the party's perceived bias towards
Ashkenazi Jews over
Mizrahi Jews also played major roles in the election result. Further embarrassment for the Alignment was brought about as Begin offered Moshe Dayan the position of
Foreign Minister despite his party not being in the coalition. Dayan accepted the offer, and was expelled from the party. After sitting as an independent MK, he founded
Telem. However, the Alignment still had an important role to play, as it helped pass the
Camp David Accords and the
Egypt–Israel peace treaty in the Knesset. This was necessary as many Likud MKs had broken away to form opposition parties (
One Israel,
Rafi – National List,
Tehiya and
Yosef Tamir as an independent) and several others (including
Ariel Sharon and
Yitzhak Shamir) abstained from voting on it. Despite losing Dayan, the party picked up two more seats as former Dash MKs
Meir Amit and
David Golomb defected from
Shinui.
1980s The party recovered well in the
1981 elections as it gained 36.6% of the vote, an improvement of 12%, and 47 seats. However, Likud took 48, allowing Begin to form the government with the help of small right-wing and religious parties. Ratz briefly merged into the Alignment, but broke away again. Nevertheless, by the end of the Knesset session the party had more seats than its rival as two Likud MKs had defected to join it. The Alignment was also boosted when the
Independent Liberals joined the alliance in 1984, though they held no seats of their own at the time. With Peres still at the head of the party, the
1984 elections resulted in stalemate. Although the Alignment won 44 seats to Likud's 41, it could not muster enough support from suitable smaller parties to form a government (the next largest party had only five seats, and two of the small left-wing parties,
Hadash and the
Progressive List for Peace were not viewed as potential coalition partners due to their radical left-wing views). However, the Likud found itself in the same situation (
Kach being impossible to work with). The result was a grand coalition of the Alignment, Likud, the National Religious Party,
Agudat Israel,
Shas,
Morasha, Shinui and Ometz (which later merged into Likud). With 97 seats, it was the largest coalition in Israeli political history aside from national unity governments. Peres and new Likud leader Yitzhak Shamir agreed to share power, with Peres Prime Minister for the first two years of the Knesset term and Shamir for the last two. When Shamir took over, Shinui left the coalition. The Alignment ended the session with six less MKs, as Mapam broke away from the party, unhappy at the power-sharing agreement with Shamir. The party also lost one MK to Ratz (
Yossi Sarid), one to Shinui (
Yitzhak Artzi) and one to the newly formed
Arab Democratic Party (
Abdulwahab Darawshe) but replaced them when the three-man
Yachad merged into the Alignment. The result of the
1988 elections was also ambiguous, with Likud winning 40 seats and the Alignment 39. Another power-sharing arrangement was made, and the coalition again had 97 members, consisting of Likud, the Alignment, the National Religious Party, Shas, Agudat Israel and
Degel HaTorah. However, in 1990 Peres made a bid for sole power through the creation of a narrow 61-seat coalition with the
Ultra-orthodox parties Shas, Agudat Israel and Degel HaTorah and the left-wing Mapam, Ratz and Shinui. Ultimately the bid failed, and the Alignment was kicked out of the coalition for the last two years of the Knesset's term. The party also lost one MK,
Efraim Gur, who left and set up
Unity for Peace and Immigration before joining Likud. The affair later became known in Israel as "
the dirty trick". On 7 October 1991 the Independent Liberals formally merged into the Israeli Labor Party. As the Independent Liberals were the sole remaining Alignment members, the alliance ceased to exist. ==Legacy==