In managing the pandemic, Netanyahu resisted deadly populism
In managing the pandemic, Netanyahu resisted deadly populism
Despite the criticisms leveled against him by his political rivals, Benjamin Netanyahu’s COVID-19 policies have helped Israel avert disaster.
(March 15, 2021 / JNS) The COVID-19 crisis and the government’s response to it is the political issue that most affected Israelis in the past year, emotionally, financially and physically. So it is only natural that every political-party head outside of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s bloc would attack his management of the crisis as a “total failure,” as New Hope party chairman Gideon Sa’ar did on
The mayor of Nazareth, the largest Arab town in Israel, announced on Feb. 11 that he was backing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Israel’s March 23 election.
Outside of Israel, this landmark development was only sparsely reported on in American media. In a Reuters’ article that highlighted Netanyahu’s anti-Arab history, Arab leaders disparaged the mayor, Ali Salam. “Maybe it’s Stockholm Syndrome, to have empathy with that person who kidnapped you or oppressed you,” Ahmad Tibi, longtime Arab-Israeli member of the Knesset, was quoted as saying.
Nowhere in the article was there any discussion of the dramatic improvements in the lives of Israel’s Arab citizens over the last 15 years. Yes, they still lag behind their Jewish peers in terms of educational access and economic opportunity, and they’re contending with an insufficiently addressed recent crime wave. But even in the face of those sobering facts, Israel has made major steps forward in fostering better quality
Illustrative image. (CarmenMurillo; iStock by Getty Images)
Several years ago, Bella Abrahams, the public affairs director at Intel Israel, spoke to a group of female students from the Ben-Gurion University of the Negev. She discussed her career journey and shared her challenges and decisions along the way. She also provided some insights on how to prepare for job applications and sending resumes.
After some time, Abrahams got a call. A young student on the line told her how helpful her speech was and how, by using Abrahams’ tools, the young woman got the job of her dreams.
That made Abrahams think.
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Mar. 3, 2021
The news last week that the United States had suffered 500,000 coronavirus deaths was accompanied by commentary noting that the toll was higher than the combined American death toll from World War II, the Korean War and the Vietnam War. That was a dramatic comparison but an unfounded one: Every year more people die of natural causes than in war. It would be fairer to compare the COVID toll to deaths from natural causes.
There’s no comparison between the 5,700 Israelis who have died from the coronavirus thus far and the 2,700 soldiers killed in the Yom Kippur War. The Yom Kippur dead were mostly young people, making their mortality rate many times higher than for their age group than in normal times.
Health Ministry reports 4,624 new cases, while 1,198 people still battle virus in hospital with 729 in serious condition and 234 on ventilators; Death toll rises to 5,779 after 20 more people succumb to the pathogen