Pale under heavy makeup, Benjamin Netanyahu stands alone facing the cameras, in an office at Sheba Hospital in Tel Aviv. The doctor just placed a pacemaker on Sunday, July 23rd. The Israeli Prime Minister revealed the night before he had a weak heart, after his first hospitalization a week ago. He smiled, wanted reassurance and promised that he would be among his people, Monday, July 24, in Parliament, to vote on the first part of his justice reform, which aims to upset the balance of power in favor of the executive.
This vote is the abyss into which the Jewish state has teetered since its creation. Shortly before that, Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi stated in a letter to the Israeli army “there will be no[it] more as a country in the region » if the army continues to break in the turmoil brought about by the reforms. Thousands of reservists, including about 500 pilots and more than 1,000 intelligence personnel, announced last weekend they would stop volunteering for the “people’s army” who completely depend on them to function properly, some immediately and others if the law is passed on Monday.
A military spokesperson acknowledged that if this movement continues, “the army’s intervention capacity will be[it] breaks down over time, and that can be a major breakdown. Saturday afternoon, July 22, a stream of people entered Jerusalem, after four days of marching from Tel Aviv and the coastal plains. Tens of thousands of these demonstrators are trying to force Netanyahu to bury reforms, which many of them have been protesting about every week since January. Organizers gathered only a few dozen people to start the march, Tuesday 18 July evening.
They compared their initiative to the “salt march” launched in 1930 by Mahatma Gandhi to win India’s independence from the British Empire. They also gave rise to the Martin Luther King march and the American civil rights movement. Others had joined them, many gray heads but also families, in the heat that was now and there approaching 40°C. Some camp in villages. Volunteers were waiting for them on highway number 1 to distribute water, lots of water, food and flags.
A general strike is being considered
The happy climber has no illusions: not one more rally will bring down Benjamin Netanyahu’s coalition. Although organizers announced Saturday night record attendance at demonstrations across the country: 220,000 people in Tel Aviv, more than 500,000 nationwide. But symbols count in democracy, and they must move the procession from the coast, largely won over to their cause, to the Holy City, where fragments of the state are scattered in the open air, where religious, secular Israelis and Palestinians live without claiming coexistence in any way. “If this law is passed, the Israeli government will find that it can legislate and exercise power, it has no country, no people, they have no army, they have no police – they have nothing.” launched one of the march’s initiators, Shikma Bressler, a physicist at the Weizmann Institute of Science.
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