The fire and the terror

How many different ways are there to say fire? As the blazes across the country threaten neighborhoods and villages, the Hebrew-language newspapers today seem to have trouble coming up with the right words to describe the terrible devastation, or even comprehend it.

“In flames,” Yedioth Aharonoth‘s simple headline reads, alongside an orange-red photo of a fire on a nearly empty Haifa street. The paper offers the saddening testimony of Haifa resident Lior El-Hai, who following the fires’ devastation in the northern city, brands himself a “refugee” in his own hometown. “The building next to the supermarket has been burned to the ground, and so has the one next to it,” writes El-Hai, describing yesterday’s phone conversations between members of his family. “That is really close to home.”

Haaretz, leading with the same picture as Yedioth, delves a bit deeper into the story, and reports that upwards of 60,000 residents of Haifa were ordered to evacuate their homes due to the flames. According to defense reporter Amos Harel, the fires serve as a reminder to Israeli security forces of the dangers that the nation might face during a full-out war. “It is possible that alongside the firing of rockets, in a future conflict Israel might have to deal with sabotage on the homefront,” Harel writes.

Keeping with Harel’s line of thinking, Israel Hayom goes one step further and jumps straight to the accusations, labeling the blazes an act of “arson terror.” The daily adds that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu branded suspected arsonists and those who encourage them as “terrorists” and promised that harsh steps would be taken against them.

“Every fire caused by arson, or by incitement to arson, is terrorism,” Netanyahu told reporters at a briefing in Haifa. “Anyone who tries to burn parts of the State of Israel will be punished severely,” he added.

Despite the prime minister’s words, some Israeli security officials have over the past days warned against jumping to conclusions about the cause of the wave of fires, saying the evidence for a widespread campaign of arson remains ambiguous.

Firefighting aircraft and hundreds of fire crews on the ground have spent much of the past few days struggling to put out the flames that were fanned by strong winds and spread through parched brush following an unseasonable dry spell. In Haifa, which also has a large Israeli Arab community, residents of a total of 11 neighborhoods were ordered to leave their homes yesterday, as fires in at least five locations consumed homes and businesses.

While the fires are the biggest concern for almost every Israeli right now, other important takes on current affairs can be found buried deep within the pages of the weekend’s major papers. One such piece of reporting can be found in Israel Hayom, which deals with Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit and his decision to order the Israel Police to formally look into the so-called submarine affair, in which Netanyahu’s personal lawyer allegedly swayed multi-billion shekel deals in favor of the German shipbuilder he was representing.

According to Israel Hayom, during a Thursday convention at the University of Haifa — a gathering which was actually cut short due to the dangers of the blazes nearby — Mandelblit was adamant in his refusal to describe the police work involving the prime minister an investigation. “Anyone who calls to launch an investigation, without a minimal underlying basis of evidence, is subverting the rule of law,” the attorney general said, according to the daily. It seems that by highlighting Mandelblit’s opinion not to launch a formal investigation, Israel Hayom, which is known for backing Netanyahu in a not-so-subtle manner, is taking a jab at the prime minister’s detractors, as well as at reporters who have attempted to shed more light on the submarine affair.

Over the past week, Hebrew-language media reported on allegations that David Shimron, the prime minister’s lawyer and relative, used his close relationship to Netanyahu to push Israel to purchase several submarines from German shipbuilder ThyssenKrupp, award the company a contract for naval vessels to defend Israel’s gas fields and allow it to build a shipyard in Israel, effectively outsourcing lucrative maintenance of the navy’s vessels. Last week, Mandelblit said there was no justification to open a criminal investigation, and the Knesset rejected a motion from the opposition Zionist Union to set up a parliamentary commission of inquiry.