13 % of all those tested for Covid-19 in Israel were positive for the virus. This makes Israel one of the more infected, per capita, in the world. Nearly 8,000 people tested positive over the last 24-hours. This was the third day running with numbers over 7,000 new infections. Israel is 24th in the world with the total number of infections now standing at 215,273 or 23,405 per million. Germany has 3,360 per million, Italy 5,035 per million, the USA number one in infections at 7,187,179 has 21,684 per million.
Other heavily infected per million were Qatar with 44,394 per million, Bahrain, 39,434, Kuwait at 23,906. Coming in after the Middle East was South America, Peru with 23,851 per million, Chile with 23,579, Panama with 25,108.
Staring Friday Sept 25th at 14:00 Israel went into another period of lockdown, called “seger” in Hebrew, that will last until after the Jewish holiday of Simchat Torah on October 10th. Israel is the first country to enter a second lockdown. However, the lockdown has been called unduly harsh by Israel’s corona czar Prof. Ronni Gamzo, who thought a graduated lockdown would be more effective by focusing first on the “red” zones where the infection was the highest, allowing most businesses to stay open and the general population to move about freely albeit with masks, social distancing and paying attention to hygiene. Gamzo’s recommendations were ignored by Prime Minister Netanyahu, who appointed him.
“The end of the previous lockdown was done too quickly,” Gamzo told the Associated Press. “The end had to be done gradually.” Gamzo did take responsibility for allowing the upper grades of the schools to open too soon. However, by going public with his criticism, Gamzo was obviously looking forward to the end of his term in the job on November 1, when he returns as CEO of Tel Aviv’s Ichilov hospital.
Pundits said that by publicly criticizing Netanyahu Gamzo had signaled he was through with the job of Czar.A new amendment to the lockdown rules was brought up for a vote in the Knesset on Thursday but was sent to the Constitution and Law committee for approval. The amendment allowed protests only within a kilometer (0.6 mile) of their homes. This would effectively eliminate those who drove to Jerusalem from anywhere in the country to protest on Saturday night. The committee met on Friday and voted not to approve the amendment. Benny Gantz of Blue and White told his party members on the committee to vote against the amendment. This after Gantz had originally met with Netanyahu in a closed session with Blue and White’s Gabi Ashkenazi, the Foreign Minister, Aryeh Deri, the Interior Minister, Yuli Edelstein the Health Minister and Gantz to draft the amendment.
Gamzo also said he was “Sick to my stomach” by Netanyahu’s move for a total lockdown based solely on the Prime Minister’s desire to end the weekly protests outside the PM’s Jerusalem residence on Balfour street that has attracted over 10,000 people every Saturday night calling for his resignation, holding up signs calling him the “Crime Minister.” Netanyahu has been indicted on three felonies but has refused to step down as Prime Minister.
“Saying I’ve called for this lockdown to stop the protests is absurd,” Netanyahu said in a live speech to the nation on Thursday night. He went on to boast how well the pandemic was being handled in Israel. However, sources inside the cabinet, according to media reports, said every time the word “demonstrations” was mentioned, Netanyahu jumped.
Deri, leader of the ultra-Orthodox Sephardi Shaas party, has said that allowing protesters to gather in huge numbers on Saturday night outside Netanyhau’s residence on Balfour street, but limiting the number of men allowed to pray in a synagogue, was anti-Democratic. Deri thought the continued protests would lead the ultra-Orthodox to ignore the regulations. Especially as the Yom Kippur holiday was approaching. One of the terms in the new amendment was that synagogues would be open on Yom Kippur. Deri had threatened to leave the coalition, forcing new elections, if his conditions were not met. They were, but still, in the end, were voted down in the Constitution, Law and Justice Committee.
Health Minister Edelstein said he would table a motion in the Knesset calling for a state of emergency in order to ban demonstrations which he considered a severe health hazard. This even though it was shown that no one was directly infected at any of the demonstrations but that ultra-Orthodox in the synagogues and yeshivot, and the Arab population, who also ignored the rules and held large weddings, were to blame for the spike in infections.
Netanyahu, in his Thursday night speech, blamed the Israeli public for not heeding the restrictions, blamed the opposition for eroding faith in the government, and others who disagreed with him. He reminded the listeners that he’d often been told by advisers what was right and wrong and had ignored them when he thought he was right. He emphasized that he’d always made the right decisions in spite of what the advisers told him to do.
Appearing on Channel 12 news just before Netanyahu’s speech, Yemina leader Neftali Bennet said that the government had no coherent plan to fight the Covid-19 pandemic. Yair Lapid, leader of the opposition, also appeared in a televised speech before Netanyahu, using a graph to show the drastic spike in infections and blaming Netanyahu for the government’s failure in fighting the pandemic.
Following Netanyahu’s speech, Channel 12 TV news political commentator Karen Marciano said that Netanyahu blamed everyone else for the pandemic and the spike in infections except himself. As Prime Minister he was the one responsible for the war on Covid-19 and he should admit that.
Yuli Edelstein’s promise to table a motion to call a state of emergency, giving Netanyahu powers to ban demonstrations and set limits on those allowed in prayer halls, was met with skepticism by critics. Both Blue and White’s Benny Gantz and Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit have come out against a state of emergency. Mandelblit reportedly said that the court would strike down such a move.
Whatever the next week holds, the Yom Kippur holiday is fast approaching. Protests will be held Saturday night. Synagogues will be open but with limited numbers Miki Zohar, Likud Party coalition whip, said in an interview on Israel’s Army Radio, that the protests would lead to a “Second Yom Kippur War.” (referencing the 1973 Yom Kippur war Israel fought against Egypt, Syria and other Arab states). Zohar said that by opposing the amendment canceling demonstrations, and limiting the numbers allowed in synagogues, the number of infections would surely rise.
While Yitzchak Yosef, son of Shaas founder, now Sephardi Chief Rabbi of Tel Aviv has said that synagogues should be closed for Yom Kippur. Deri and former Housing Minister Yitzchak Litzman, also former Health Minister, head of the ultra-Orthodox Degal HaTorah party, have said that it would be difficult to keep ultra-Orthodox men out of synagogue on the holiest day of the year.
One ultra-Orthodox rabbi in Benei Brak, a red zone with a large number of Covid-19 infections, has said as long as Israelis can demonstrate and go to the beach why should he and his people be kept out of synagogue.
Still, Covid-19 Czar Gamzo thought that the restrictions being put in place by the lockdown should see a downturn in infections within two weeks. The current spike, according to media reports, is based on the end of year parties among high school graduates, large gatherings at weddings in Jewish and Arab communities, and lack of attention to wearing masks and keeping a social distance.
A similar complaint is being heard against the ultra-Orthodox community in New York city’s Crown Heights and Borough Park neighborhoods, where a spike in infections has also been seen. City officials say that the ultra-Orthodox are ignoring the health recommendations of wearing masks and keeping a safe distance.
Whatever the outcome, as the Jewish New Year begins, unless the Covid-19 is brought under control, the physical and economic effects will, according to experts, bring countries like Israel to the brink of a cascading disaster. As Blue and White’s Gantz said, there are more important things to worry about than demonstrations on Balfour street.
