Transportation department failure: Pilgrims over reservists - opinion

Last week, during Rosh Hashanah, thousands of Israelis received call-up orders to their IDF reserve units. They were told to report to their bases and join the war effort, both in the South and the North.

The problem? Most of these reservists – along with regular soldiers given a night at home – had no way of getting back to their bases. On holidays and over Shabbat, public transportation in Israel comes to a stop. Although the IDF arranged transport from certain meeting points in major cities, how were soldiers supposed to reach those points?

Once again, the government failed to provide a solution. Social media exploded with pleas for rides. One Golani officer wrote how his sergeant, stuck in Eilat, needed to get to the Golan Heights. Soldiers ordered to report to the Kirya military headquarters in Tel Aviv were told they couldn’t park inside the base. A commander suggested they find parking in nearby lots.

This isn’t just absurd; it’s insulting. These people were called up to serve their country – and they had to find their own way there and pay for their own parking?

It was a harsh reminder of what happened on October 7. That day, too, was a holiday, and public transportation wasn’t running. Civilians drove their cars down South and up North, only to be stranded for weeks. Eventually, volunteers stepped in, offering to drive these soldiers’ cars back home, where their spouses desperately needed them.

Classic Israel: People step up 

This is classic Israel. In moments of crisis, the people step up. Israelis don’t wait for the government to act; they fill the void left by politicians.

And where was the government? Nowhere near where it should have been – taking care of its citizens. Transportation Minister Miri Regev was one example. Just before the holiday, she was in Hungary, attending a conference she claimed was crucial to overturn the EU’s travel advisory against flights to Israel.

On Tuesday night, as Iranian missiles were headed toward Israel, Regev was photographed at a Budapest mall, outside a jewelry store. When she finally returned, she claimed on a radio show that she had been present for the security cabinet meeting after the missile attack – only to correct herself when pressed by the interviewer, admitting that she was not at the meeting since she was still overseas.

Meanwhile, around 40,000 Israelis were stranded around the world, unable to catch flights back to Israel, and reservists were scrambling to find rides to their bases. And Regev? She fudged the truth and backpedaled only when caught.

Who, then, do Regev and her fellow ministers care about? Not the reservists or the regular Israelis who are stranded overseas because of flight cancellations. Instead, they care, as often happens, only about the groups that interest them – in this case, the Israelis who ignored government warnings and traveled to Uman for the holiday. A week later, many of them are still stuck in Romania and Ukraine.

Forty thousand Israelis are stranded globally, and the government is doing barely anything. For the Uman pilgrims, the picture is completely different. The Shas party, for example, is turning over tables demanding the state send planes to bring the worshipers home.

And guess what? The country has been working around the clock to help organize dozens of flights from a small airfield in Romania to return the Uman travelers.

Soldiers? No. Stranded Israelis? No. Uman pilgrims? Yes.

Simple answers

Why? Why would the state prioritize this? Why isn’t it organizing transportation for soldiers or asking El Al to add flights on Shabbat? Why not charter planes to bring people back from Greece?

The answer is simple: The soldiers and stranded Israelis don’t have political sway in the Knesset. They aren’t vital to the coalition’s survival. Sometimes, it’s all about who you know.

It’s as if the government no longer cares about trampling over the average Israeli. Look at the IDF draft law. Just a few days ago, news broke that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has promised United Torah Judaism that he will pass a law exempting haredim (ultra-Orthodox) from military service by the end of the month. This promise came in response to haredi threats to block the state budget unless the draft exemption law is first passed.

In other words, not only does the government neglect to organize transport for soldiers during emergencies, but it’s also on the verge of solidifying a law that will exempt 13% of the population from service altogether. The very people who carry the burden of the nation’s security and economy on their shoulders will simply be forced to do more.

This has to change. The idea that haredim can continue to make demands after everything we’ve endured this past year is ludicrous. The IDF is lacking thousands of soldiers, and many are being called up for their third or fourth round of reserve duty. Does UTJ leader Yitzhak Goldknopf care? Does Netanyahu? Sadly, we know the answer.

Isn’t it time to put the country first? After a year of war, shouldn’t we realize that the old paradigms no longer work? If October 7 taught us anything, it’s that we need to reform not just our security strategy but also the way we function as a society.

The wars in Gaza and Lebanon are about changing the security reality and ensuring that the terror groups on our borders can no longer grow into the monstrous threats they had become. But change must also come from within. The haredim must begin to shoulder their share of the burden in this society. They must serve in the military, work, and contribute to the nation they want to call home.

The writer is a senior fellow at the Jewish People Policy Institute (JPPI) and a former editor-in-chief of The Jerusalem Post.