In its sitting on Monday, the Knesset Plenum held a debate with the participation of the Prime Minister, at the request of 40 Members of Knesset, on the topic of “An extreme Government that acts against the Zionist majority and harms national unity and the basic values of the State of Israel.”
During the debate, Leader of the Opposition MK Yair Lapid (Yesh Atid) said, “I ask Israel’s citizens—do you live better or worse than three years ago? What is the state of your bank account? Is your life more costly or less? What about your children’s education, is it better or worse?
“All that is before I have mentioned October 7, the most terrible event that has happened to this country, and it too happened over the past three years. And that is before I have mentioned the fact that while our heroic combatants are being killed and injured every day, your Government is advancing a disgraceful and shameful draft-dodging bill, which will also not pass. We are in an election year, so that is what we will go to elections over, what is happening in the life of real people.
“I remind you that things can be different. During [the term of] our Government, we lowered the percentage of violent crime dramatically, the protection racketeering, the murders, the sexual offenses, the violence. These are not opinions, these are facts. People felt safe to leave the house. We didn’t perform any miracles. We worked at it in a thorough, orderly and quiet manner. All the professional officials would come to me, to the Prime Minister’s Office, to report to me personally on their progress.
“The cost of living is causing the collapse of an entire generation of Israelis. They have understood that no one is really going to deal with this. Your Government continues to transfer NIS 60 billion every year to draft-dodgers, and continues to maintain ministries that are completely unnecessary. It continues to transfer coalition funds here at night as if there were no tomorrow.
“Something else happened while you weren’t here. Your Minister of Finance said that the President of the Supreme Court should be trampled. You got up here recently and said that you recognized the fact that [Justice] Isaac Amit was President of the Supreme Court. I appreciated that. How is it that we have not heard a word of condemnation from you? I stood here time after time and said that I was adamantly opposed to any incitement against the Prime Minister and his family. How are you keeping silent?
“The data from the Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS) has been released, and it has become apparent that for two years there has been a peak of negative migration from Israel; 69,300 Israeli citizens have left Israel this year. Over the past three years, 200,000 have left. Last year, 875 physicians left Israel, and 3,000 engineers left the country. According to the CBS, that is the profile of those who are leaving: Young people, educated, working, who pay taxes and serve in reserves. The backbone of this country. The people who keep it alive.
“They are leaving in hundreds of thousands, an entire emigration movement, because they feel they have been forsaken by a Government that hates them, does not appreciate their sacrifice, is indifferent to their difficulty, is contemptuous of their values. I think, of course, that they are wrong; I think that we must not give up.
“Israel is a cause that is worth fighting for. Not only do I love this country, I also believe in it. It has been and remains the best country in the world to raise children. That is the tragedy. They don’t hate the country, they have despaired. They looked at your Government, Mr. [Prime Minister], and stopped believing in the State of Israel’s future. Don’t you think that is a problem?
“Bereaved families are shattered when they see how an attempt is being made to give the Haredim an exemption from bereavement. Maya Ohana Moreno, widow of Israeli hero Emmanuel Moreno, came to the foreign affairs and Defense committee and told about her orphaned children, who insisted on becoming combat soldiers. The answer she got was when [MK Yitshak] Goldknop (United Torah Judaism) came to the meeting especially to say that telling the Haredim to enlist is like putting a yellow badge on them. My father had a yellow badge in the ghetto. Then he made Aliyah and enlisted in the Jewish army so that it would not happen again.
“Three years ago, I was Prime Minister. Life was better. I stood here and said to you, ‘I am handing over to you a country in excellent condition,’ because that’s what we were. A country in excellent condition. Strong, safe, Hamas knew that it could not cross the fence, the world was in favor of us, the economy was excellent. We managed this country much better than you. More quietly, many fewer dead and injured, much more efficiently. That is what we know how to do. Instead of whining about the deep state and the court, we know how to work and to manage a country for the benefit of its citizens.
“We will come and propose a new dawn for the State of Israel. We will propose the possibility that we will not define ourselves by the quarrels among us. We will propose the possibility that unity is not when everyone thinks the same; unity is mutual respect. That basic thing, when you are capable of listening to people who think differently from you.
“We know how to lower crime, to lower the cost of living, to lower the noise and the toxicity that surround our lives. We know how to take NIS 60 billion from the draft-dodgers and to transfer them to education, healthcare and policing. We know how to make the world go back to loving the State of Israel. Without having Palestinian flags greet our young people when they take their post-army trips.
“We know how to make a judicial reform. A judicial reform needs to be made, I have always thought so, but it must be done with moderation, cautiously, to repair and not to destroy. With us, the reform will end in a constitution, not a civil war. We know how to manage security. Security is managed when it can be taken for granted. When the citizens don’t think about it. They know that the Government will respond to any threat swiftly, with force and without hesitation. Unlike you, we know how to run a country, and we don’t think only about ourselves, but about all of Israel’s citizens,” said Leader of the Opposition MK Lapid.
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