Some 20 MKs from the right and left have announced their
intentions to remain in the Gush Katif area during the
Disengagement. The goal of the MKs from the right is to
encourage the settlers to protest the evacuation and to act
as a pacifying force if necessary. Meanwhile the goal of the
MKs from the left is primarily to encourage the security
forces and to see for themselves whether the plan is carried
out properly.
All an MK has to do to enter the Gaza Strip is to flash his
Member of Knesset ID card at a roadblock and drive right in
with up to three assistants. But Knesset Officer Yitzhak
Shedar made one stipulation. According to a directive he
issued, the assistants must remain with the MK and register
at the roadblock upon exiting and any MK who does not
register them will be penalized: the next time he travels to
Gush Katif he will have to go unaccompanied even if he claims
all of the assistants came out with him.
This measure stems from concerns right-wing MKs could misuse
their right to bring in three assistants during each visit,
essentially smuggling outsiders into Gush Katif. In other
words all 120 MKs are suspect of transgressing the law or
abetting transgressors.
The directive also stipulates not just anyone can hop in the
MK's car and cruise into Gush Katif, but rather only
individuals with a valid, regular entry permit. So what is
the security apparatus so afraid of? How many people have
regular entry permits, are assistants to right-wing MKs and
want to stay in Gush Katif illegally? No more than a handful
meet this description.
The extreme directive, which offended many MKs, points to the
great hysteria among government officials as the
Disengagement draws near and their fears the evacuation will
not go smoothly and could even deteriorate, choliloh,
to the point of bloodshed.
The Anti-Education Ministry
The Education Ministry insists on not learning its lesson. On
one hand ministry officials bemoan the state of decline among
youth in government schools and the rise in violence
everywhere and at every age level. On the other hand they do
not seem to understand that the behavior of the young
generation will not change until the education is upturned at
the roots and the children provided with traditional values
and their Jewish heritage.
Numerous committees have already hashed out the failure of
the government education system and the innumerable reports
written on the matter. And roadways are lined with billboards
calling for the proposed reforms to be carried out. Yet the
Education Ministry has yet to arrive at the most elementary
solution—to strengthen the ties between children and
their past—not because they are unaware this is the
obvious solution but because they are afraid of it. Afraid of
the results.
And in the 5766 school year they plan to make matters worse
by adding a new subject to the curriculum: multiculturalism.
The curriculum for multiculturalism includes anti-Israel
stances by radical and militant Arabs.
Rather than highlighting the culture of the Jewish people,
which is the only guarantee Israeli youth will retain its
Jewish identity, the Education Ministry seeks to integrate
various foreign cultures into the curriculum, a path sure to
rapidly destroy any shreds of Jewish identity still remaining
among students at government schools, equip them with
universal values and sever them from any national and Jewish
values they may have. This is what the Education
Ministry—or more aptly the Anti-Education
Ministry—stands to achieve.
MK Rabbi Meir Porush, who was shocked by the move, has
announced he will demand an urgent meeting to discuss this
issue in the Knesset Education Committee despite the summer
recess, though he knows it is a lost cause. After all what
can the Committee accomplish? The Education Ministry is
headed by a Likud minister from the nationalist camp. The
kind of Likud member who regularly proclaims herself to be
close to the Jewish heritage. Yet she is the selfsame person
behind the decision to add this new subject to the
curriculum. So how could the Education Committee, which is
headed by Avraham Poraz of Shinui, possibly do something to
alter this decision?
