No government members showed up at a Knesset debate today on the report released by the state comptroller earlier this month, on Israel’s woeful preparations for missile attacks.
Instead it was left to opposition figures to highlight Israel’s predicament.
Zionist Union MK, and former IDF general, Eyal Ben-Reuven says the next war in northern Israel is inevitable, but predicts the government will only act to safeguard the area after there has been a tragedy.
“After [the 2014 Gaza war] — with an emphasis on after — we fortified the south, and that’s fine. But maybe one time we can do something ahead of time? One time?,” he asks.
Devorah Israeli, of Nitzan, with 8-year-old Idan and 6-month-old Ron in the sewage pipe bomb shelter next to her caravilla during Operation Protective Edge in summer 2014. (Melanie Lidman/Times of Israel)
“The state is abandoning its residents,” he says.
Brig. Gen. (res.) Yossi Beinhorn from the State Comptroller’s Office warns that approximately one-third of the residents of northern Israel do not have access to a proper bomb shelter and that though many schools in southern Israel are protected against rockets, some remain vulnerable to attack.
In addition, he says, evacuation plans for civilian populations are not fully realized and implementable. Ze’ev Tzuk-Ram, the deputy head of the National Security Council, tells the committee that the NSC had begun working on evacuation plans, but Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman put the kibosh on them.
— Judah Ari Gross
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Tuesday, December 13, 2016
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