Advertising
Supported by
Israel has been experiencing one of the world’s worst coronavirus epidemics lately, but the government’s reaction has stagnated in political and cultural wars.
By Isabel Kershner
JERUSALEM – Warning that his country can simply manipulate “the edge of the abyss,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu imposed an even stricter blockade than he announced last week to restrict the spread of coronavirus in Israel, which now has the rate of new cases. consistent with the world’s capita.
The new measures assume that from Friday, in the midst of the Jewish holiday, everyone, an essential worker, must stay home after work. other people, all of whom will have to have traveled no more than 1,000 meters from their homes.
“We have heard the experts say that if we do not take strong and swift action, we will succeed on the edge of the abyss,” Netanyahu said in his cabinet, who met all night to discuss lockout restrictions after the news series The number of instances consistent with the day had risen to approximately 7,000.
But intense haggling over the lockdown in recent weeks has revealed how Israel’s reaction to the coronavirus has stalled in its political and cultural wars.
The war pitted the sometimes pro-Netanyahu ultra-Orthodox who opposed the strong contingent of anti-Netanyahu protesters. The ultra-Orthodox leaders argued that they were allowed to pray without restriction as long as the protesters were allowed to demonstrate en masse, and the protesters argued that the conditions were not comparable because the protests were in the open air and that the government sought to use the virus as an excuse to end the opposition.
Regulations announced Thursday ended protests and indoor worship well, made an exception for Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish calendar, which begins at Sunset on Sunday. the number of worshippers.
The protests, which attracted tens of thousands of protesters each week to the open-air streets of Netanyahu in Jerusalem, demand their resignation. Netanyahu, a polarizing conservative, is being tried for corruption and many Israelis blame him for not saving him the highest rate of infections in the country.
Protesters and anarchists and spreaders of the virus have long been denounced, and until Thursday they were allowed to continue protesting an Israeli law that protects freedom of demonstration.
A developing choir has criticized mass protests, saying it was unfair to allow them to continue when there were already restrictions on prayer on the net, and that the hole was causing an erosion of public acceptance as true and non-compliance with other anti-guideline measures on viruses.
The debate over protests and prayers summed up the division in Israeli society, said Gayil Talshir, a political scientist at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Protests are at the heart of the left-wing liberal constituency, while synagogues symbolize the national-religious vision of Camp Netanyahu.
Advertising