Dozens of demonstrators carrying torches on Saturday night broke through police barricades and went down to the Ayalon Highway, Tel Aviv’s main traffic artery, blocked them, and held a north-bound march starting at the Azrieli high risers. The demonstrators ignored police announcements that blocking a major artery was illegal. In the process of flagrantly ignoring the law, the demonstrators bit two police officers, who were evacuated for medical treatment, and beat up other policemen, who were treated on the spot. A total of 21 protesters were arrested. It took police more than four hours to reopen the highway. Needless to say, had this been a demonstration of Haredim we would have witnessed many bashed heads adorned by beards and earlocks.
One demonstrator used a broad brush to spell out across the asphalt: “Bibi Is a Traitor.” He completed his art project unmolested, in brazen violation of the law. Because left-wingers are a special class when it comes to police response. Haredim and settlers get beaten so badly that their mothers can’t recognize them, but leftists are “contained.”
A few demonstrators lit up a bonfire on the highway.
It was the eighth Saturday night in which demonstrators took to the street. This time they were particularly violent because, despite their seven earlier weeks of rallies, the coalition government that represents a hefty majority of the Jews in Israel (64 vs. 46 Knesset mandates – the Arabs control the remaining 10 and have been for the most part disinterested) moved ahead to pass the first phase of the judicial reform in a first plenum vote.
Israeli leftists are getting a taste of what it’s like to be ignored.
The organizers claimed that 300,000 protested across Israel, but in many cases, such as Haifa and Jerusalem, the images of several thousand did not support the headlines claiming 25,000.
“Democracy” rioters prevented a right-wing reporter from doing his job Saturday night:
The rallies were led by boomers, including former PM Ehud Barak, who is 81, who screamed at his audience: “This is the worst crisis since the establishment of the state. We are here, secular and religious, Jews and Arabs, to defend the Declaration of Independence. Before us is a regime coup, which is the assassination of democracy. This is an attempt to turn Israel into a dictatorship along the lines of Hungary and Poland. And we won’t let that happen. we will struggle and we will win!”
Here’s a link to Israel’s Declaration of Independence, the English version, on the Knesset website. Try to find the words “democracy” or “democratic” in it. You won’t find them.
The word “Arab” appears once: the declaration sees them as enemies who should come around to become equal members of the new state.
That’s not to say that the authors of the declaration were anti-democratic, they weren’t. But they were much more concerned about establishing Israel as a Jewish State for all the Jews, at home and abroad. They put it so succinctly: “This right is the natural right of the Jewish people to be masters of their own fate, like all other nations, in their own sovereign State.”
The Declaration of Independence promised equality, a value that was completely ignored by the police Saturday night. As Minister Bezalel Smotrich put it: “For much less than that, the police beat the crap out of the deportation from Gush Katif and northern Samaria, girls were sent to detention until the end of the proceedings, yours truly spent three weeks in Shin Bet detention in Wing 7 of Shikmah prison in Ashkelon in the company of several dozen Hamas terrorists, and five indictments were filed against [south Tel Aviv anti-illegal aliens’ invasion] Shefi Paz and she was sent to house arrest.”
על הרבה פחות מזה המשטרה פירקה למתנגדי הגירוש מגוש קטיף וצפון השומרון את הצורה במכות, ילדות נשלחו למעצר עד תום ההליכים, עבדכם הנאמן ישב שלושה שבועות במעצר שב”כ באגף 7 בכלא שקמה באשקלון עם כמה עשרות מחבלי חמאס, וכנגד שפי פז הוגשו חמישה כתבי אישום והיא נשלחה למעצר בית.>>> pic.twitter.com/HnQ7uEBTnz
— בצלאל סמוטריץ’ (@bezalelsm) February 25, 2023
Shefi Paz, for her part, tweeted the video of the man painting “Bibi Is a Traitor” and added: 9 arrests. 5 indictments with 16 counts of defacement of real estate. 76 days under house arrest. That’s the price I’ve paid so far for graffiti. If this man is not arrested tonight and if no indictment is filed against him, the court should start issuing warrants against me next, because I will no longer attend hearings of my own free will.
9 מעצרים.
5 כתבי אישום עם 16 סעיפים על השחתת פני מקרקעין.
76 ימים במעצר בית.
זה המחיר שאני שילמתי עד כה על גרפיטי.אם האיש הזה לא נעצר עוד הלילה ואם לא מוגש נגדו כתב אישום, כדאי שבית המשפט יתחיל להוציא נגדי צווי הבאה, כי אני לא אגיע יותר לדיונים מרצוני החופשי.@IL_police pic.twitter.com/hKV1Ux8gf2
— sheffi paz • שפי פז (@sheffipaz) February 25, 2023
National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir is beginning to realize the challenges he is facing in trying to get the police to follow his orders. They are ignoring him the way the leftist crowd is ignoring them.
He issued a statement saying: “I instructed the police to act with zero tolerance in the face of violence, incitement, and anarchy. Anarchists must not be allowed to set fire to Tel Aviv.”
Good luck with that one, Minister. The police obey their commanders, starting with Commissioner Kobi Shabtai, and he is part of the problem, not the solution. Anarchy begins at home.
