Lapid: We shouldn’t have been forced to lock down, gov’t has failed

Opposition leader Yair Lapid rips into the lockdown rules but urges Israelis to follow the regulations.

“The State of Israel is entering a lockdown it didn’t need to enter.”

“It’s Netanyahu’s failure. It could have been managed differently, it should have been managed differently,” he says.

He says it’s untrue that the world is helpless in the face of the second wave of the virus, “It’s another lie over which the government has lost public trust.” He says governments around the world that prepared were able to keep numbers down.

Lapid says the government doesn’t have a plan. But he says the lockdown rules must be observed.

“We will pray responsibly, we will protest responsibly… We won’t let Netanyahu turn this into a war between secular and religious [people],” he says.

“The government isn’t protecting us; let us protect ourselves,” says Lapid.

Laying out his own plan, Lapid says the government needs an exit strategy; a financial plan for the self-employed; contact tracing; a spokesperson for the virus response; and to transfer authority to local councils to handle the virus. He says ministers who violate the rules should resign, including the prime minister.

“We must rebuild public trust,” he says.