Let My People Go to the Hospital!

According to an op-ed on YNET, Israel is not prepared for a coronavirus outbreak here.  Anyone here who is waiting on welfare checks or treatment at a hospital knows this.  Most of my elderly clients are in just this situation.

Guess who is largely responsible for the immediate crisis- our supreme leader of a state within who holds court in the Health Ministry.  In the last year, his stubbornness has thrown the Israeli political system into the three ring/election circus that may or not be over on March 3rd and in the days following it as Bibi tries to patch together a Knesset majority of 61.  While there are other participants in the disaster, he is the biggest of them all and the most guilty.

Consider this Deputy Health Minister Litzman:  in 10 days China threw up an entire 1000 bed hospital in Wuhan to deal with a pandemic and is racing to build others.  In the face of the worst pandemic since probably Ebola, they are behaving heroically and in an organized fashion.  How many hospitals are you building when there is no social security budget, largely thanks to you?

What have you accomplished lately, other than sucking down more billions for your constituents and to hell with everyone else?  Every unnecessary election caused by you costs Israelis billions of more shekels.  I forget the exact figure, but the YNET report I saw said it could have been spent on building 5 hospitals, ones that we desperately need here.  As a part-time care giver here for the elderly, I have seen the pain first hand.  There is chronic overcrowding in Jerusalem hospitals as my clients are warehoused in the hallways with a shortage of nurses and doctors.  Do you care?  Actions speak louder than words and your silence is deafening.

I guess the best you can give us in a pandemic is personal prayer.  Instead of action, you are busy defending Mrs. Leifer who is fighting extradition to Australia for violating 74 young girls as well as other scandals that have interested the police in making you a lifer yourself. As haredi rioters shut down the country at the drop of a black hat for God knows what the momentary reason is, the police stand by, held back by a prime minister who himself is corrupt and only wants to get reelected.

Former UK Chief Rabbi Jonathan Sacks wrote a book called Not in God’s Name.  Well, rabbi, where should the police send their bill? Where should the bill for the misery of patients, lost wages, time, etc., be sent? If a patient has died because of a delay getting their ambulance to the hospital on time, will you take responsibility financially, let alone morally? Is your address at the Health Ministry available for billing purposes? I’m not holding my breath.

We always talk about a two state solution being dead.  However, there is a two state regime right now in place, one which has nothing to do with the Palestinians. There is an unofficial and insidious fundamentalist religious state within the regular state of Israel racing to take over the lives of the other 90%.

Bibi needs you and every lunatic at the fringe to prolong his rule.  You and your cronies’ rule needs to end right now.  Socialism and secularism built Israel.  We need to get back to those roots now than more than ever before.