Herzog snipes at Netanyahu for ‘fleeing’ to Africa
Opposition leader accuses prime minister of skipping town in the midst of political and security crises
Opposition leader Isaac Herzog fired a broadside at Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday, accusing him of fleeing to Africa for state visits and leaving the country in the lurch in the midst of a security crisis.
Netanyahu arrived in Uganda earlier in the day, the first stop in a four-country tour that’s been on the books for months and was scheduled to coincide with the 40th anniversary of Operation Entebbe.
“It seems that Netanyahu went to give up in Africa, and leave the whole country without a solution to the wave of terrorism, without a solution to the crisis of the settlers, without a solution to the cries of pain from the families of the missing [Israelis held in Gaza],” the Zionist Union leader told a meeting of his party.
Herzog alluded to the two deadly terrorist attacks on Israeli civilians in the West Bank last week, as well as to the protests by Israeli parents over the government’s failure to include the return of their soldier sons’ bodies from Hamas as part of a recent reconciliation deal with Turkey. The families of Oron Shaul and Hadar Goldin, who both fell in the 2014 Gaza war with Hamas, were joined in their protests by the family of Avraham Abera Mengistu, who is believed to have been held captive in Gaza since September 2014.
“Netanyahu didn’t travel — he fled from a military solution and a political solution,” Herzog charged.
Both issues have been the cause of strife within the cabinet, with the Jewish Home party objecting to the terms of the rapprochement deal reached with Turkey and saying the measures the government has taken to crack down on Palestinian violence were insufficient.
Netanyahu’s trip — the first visit by a sitting prime minister to sub-Saharan Africa in decades — kicked off with a ceremony Monday at the old Entebbe airport in Uganda, where Netanyahu marked the 40th anniversary of one of Israel’s most legendary operations to free a group of Israeli hostages.
Netanyahu is slated to hold a summit with the presidents of Uganda, Kenya, South Sudan and Zambia, plus the prime minister of Ethiopia, Hailemariam Desalegn, and the foreign minister of Tanzania, Augustine Mahiga.
He will then visit Kenya, Rwanda and Ethiopia before returning to Israel.
