The decision by the Tel Aviv school to postpone outings to Jerusalem for fear of the Arab violence taking place there, is not essentially different from the decision made by the residents of Nahal Oz this summer, who chose to abandon their homes in the face of their lack of confidence in the government’s ability to protect them from Hamas rocket attacks, said MK Moshe Feiglin after more violence in Israel’s capital. “With great regret, I must say that in both situations, the correct decision was made.”
“We need to understand,” Feiglin continued – “the British Mandate is over. We are no longer in the days of ‘tower and stockade,” when early Zionist pioneers would settle and secure new outposts overnight in the face of hostile Arabs and British. Back then, it was correct to fight the enemy by means of the citizens. But today we have a state and its central task is to provide security. That is why the state has an army and a police force.”
MK Feiglin maintained that “the leadership cannot evade responsibility for the security of its citizens and place the burden on the shoulders of the citizens with patriotic arguments from the past, which today – are nothing more than a fig leaf for the bankruptcy of the defense establishment.
If the IDF in Gaza and the police in Jerusalem would receive the order to win – and if it was clear that they would do so speedily and with determination, it would be acceptable for the government to demand that its citizens shoulder their part of the burden and continue visiting the capital in a show of solidarity and civilian courage.
But if the government, the army and the police choose to ‘manage the conflict’ as if they were a Limited Corporation and not a sovereign state, then we can certainly understand the decision of the residents of Nahal Oz or the parents council of Tel Aviv, who are not interested in taking part in the games of these ‘managers’ – endangering their children to allow the state to avoid its responsibilities,” Feiglin concluded.
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