Education Minister Yuli Tamir (Labor) has severely damaged the Labor party by her opposition to high school teachers in their strike, Labor ministers Ami Ayalon and Binyamin Ben-Eliezer and former party secretary Eitan Cabel told Labor members Thursday night. Infrastructure Minister Ben-Eliezer said her stand attacks the principle of Labor.
 
"You have turned us into pawns of the Finance Ministry," he told the Education Minister, who formerly was president of Ben Gurion University. However, Defense Minister Ehud Barak, chairman of the Labor party, backed her. The high school teachers' strike now is in its fourth week.