Who do you trust?
When guardrails go down, hands go in the cookie jar and people take liberties, with some of the hardest hit being those in need. Our ‘leaders’ haven’t exactly served as an inspiration for better behavior
David Ben-Gurion. Have we achieved his idea of true statehood? Probably more than he ever imagined would happen.
I see that Tomer Glam, mayor of the southern coastal city of Ashkelon, was arrested together with other municipal officials and several outsiders for allegedly making off with millions in contributions earmarked for post-war reconstruction. The charges include theft, fraud, bribery and money laundering.
Ashkelon is close by the Gaza Strip and sustained heavy damage from rocket fire on and since October 7, 2023. Several of the civilian deaths from the conflict took place there or in the immediate vicinity.
As for the Gaza Strip – mostly flattened by the IDF, with tens of thousands of Palestinian civilians believed to have been killed alongside similar numbers of Islamist combatants – Israel has been allowing the wide scale entry of humanitarian aid as part of the ceasefire agreement with Hamas.
So now I hear that 13 Israelis have been arrested for allegedly smuggling into the enclave cigarettes and so-called dual-use goods, meaning material or equipment that can be repurposed by Hamas for more nefarious deeds. One of the suspects? The brother of the new head of the Shin Bet, Israel’s domestic security service, which more or less parallels America’s FBI or Britain’s MI5.
Betzalel Zini is (so far) accused of being only a bit player on the cigarette end, but still reportedly netted well north of $100,000. While smokes can’t be repurposed for much more than cultivating lung cancer, they, like most everything that goes into the Gaza Strip these days, go directly to Hamas. Hamas then sells them to the black market, where it’s said that more than a few war-weary Gazans are willing to part with $100 for a single butt.
The money that goes into Hamas’s pockets helps it pay its members and – much more important – attract new ones. (So much for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s “total victory.”) It can also use the cash to pay for new weapons, the construction of new tunnels and…. well, let’s just say that two of the charges leveled at Zini and at least two of the other suspects are financing terror activity (a very serious allegation) and assisting the enemy during wartime (an extremely serious charge that under Israeli law can mean treason).
Having digested all this, I hear my phone ring. The screen warns that it’s spam or even a fraudster. Do I answer? Sometimes a call from my health fund elicits the same warning. So I do.
The caller says she’s from a certain charity and informs me that I can donate directly through her. I ask instead that she allow me to do so through the charity’s website. There are ways to tell if something online is on the up and up. It’s harder over the phone.
WHEN I WAS A KID and home sick from school, there was a daytime TV quiz show emceed by a young Johnny Carson. It was called “Who Do You Trust?”
Its premise lay in asking a male contestant whether he felt capable of answering a question about a somewhat esoteric subject, or whether he’d “trust” his female teammate to do so. (This being the very early 1960s, I don’t believe the female contestant was ever given the luxury of deciding whether she’d trust her male partner.)
So lately and very often, with all the guardrails that have been knocked down, trashed and chewed up around here by a government of fascists, goons, nincompoops and thieves hell-bent on turning Israel into something it was not meant to be, I think of that game show.
And to be honest, there are no longer a lot of people I trust. I trust my wife. I trust my kids, other family members and close friends (although you never really know about the serial killer lurking amongst us). There were a few guys in my army unit to whom I blindly entrusted my life, and would do so again today. But beyond them? Nah. Not really.
I mean, just read some recent headlines about our so-called leaders:
Likud MK’s questioning said to focus on allegation of bribing witness to lie about sexual assault (Times of Israel, July 25, 2025)
Qatar said to have paid Israeli officials, including Netanyahu aides, total of $10 million (ToI, August 8, 2025)
Likud MK Bitan takes stand in bribery trial, proclaims innocence (ToI, September 9, 2025)
Police said to recruit state’s witness in blockbuster fraud case surrounding Likud minister (ToI, September 17, 2025)
Police declare Netanyahu’s ex-campaign adviser Einhorn a ‘fugitive’ with arrest warrant against him (ToI, January 12, 2026)
Katz says he and Netanyahu working to legalize 140 West Bank farming outposts (ToI, February 3, 2026)
Army, police probing alleged settler arson and vandalism in West Bank Christian village (ToI, February 5, 2026)
Oh. And did I mention that our prime minister has long been on trial for alleged bribery, fraud and breach of trust?
IN ONE OR ANOTHER VERSION, it’s said that David Ben-Gurion, Israel’s first prime minister, believed Israel would not be a country in the truest sense until it had Jewish cops collaring Jewish prostitutes and Jewish bank robbers. Accordingly, we’ve been a genuine country for quite some time.
But lately, our leaders and people close to them have crossed a line, themselves having moved from the occasional transgression to a soap opera of serious crimes that involve deep corruption, violence and apparently even national betrayal, turning such behavior almost into the norm. (Do you know that Wikipedia has a page titled “List of Israeli public officials convicted of crimes or misdemeanors” that includes people who have served time after serving not only as president and prime minister, but even chief rabbi?)
So do I believe everything our leaders say? (Do I believe anything they say?) The sad part is that if I don’t know someone, I now tend to expect the worst rather than the best. I’ll have my doubts when someone comes calling for a few shekels for hungry kids or the war wounded or pensioners who must choose between food or heat. And people will continue to suffer.
We’re supposed to look to our leaders for inspiration. Nowadays, that inspiration isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. It’s more a cautionary tale.
