Time to rebuild the government before it's fully destroyed - opinion

When I try to remind myself of the chain of events of April 14, 2024, I think of it a bit like how battle legacies are told about the 1973 Yom Kippur War.

Unverified reports ran amok on that fateful Saturday that the prime minister was spending the weekend at the house of a billionaire friend who allegedly has a nuclear shelter. 

The Israeli anxiety threshold, which was already unhealthy, was reaching its peak.

Then it was revealed that a Zion Wing plane, the Air Force One of the Israeli prime minister, took off without informing who was on it. Was someone running away? Were we sending a designated survival government abroad? Was a nuclear strike expected?

The prime minister did not update the public, and no one made an official statement until 10:41 p.m. when the prime minister made a laconic statement that an Iranian attack was expected.

We were first told that the attack would arrive in nine hours, but that very quickly went down to three hours. “There are cruise missiles on the way,” they said.

Iran revealed that they had placed a stopwatch at the top of a central square, counting down to the destruction of Israel. A little after midnight, our airspace was closed.

The country is in search of hope

What do we do now? The whole country was awake, immobile in front of the television, waiting for comfort, hope, information, anything.

Do we go to sleep? Wake the children? The government must have the solutions. Echoes of explosions were heard around Jerusalem, no sirens sounding, then the sirens came, then reports of fallen missiles.

Then came the announcement of a significant Israeli response. We understand: We are in a regional war. Against the backdrop of the Iranian attack – and it is quite difficult to mention real life at this point – the Education Ministry announced that schools would be closed for 48 hours. Home Front Command then announced that workplaces may continue operating as usual.

Women are missing in the government's equation 

ISRAEL HAS yet to solve the impossible equation, in its 76 years, in which workplaces are open while schools are closed. What is the obvious missing factor in the equation? Women. 

In most cases, women will stay at home and not go to work. Behind this decision is also an economic consideration, which states that the loss of a woman’s work day to the familial income is a smaller loss than that of a man.

That is only possibly true, and it requires correction. The ambiguity regarding this and the lack of transparency in the decision-making processes is disturbing. Some argue that there is no decision-making process at all and that another thing we have not yet learned from October 7 is our addiction to pushing and postponing important issues.

Another thing we didn’t learn from October 7 is the importance of international alliances. National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir – or, more accurately, the police minister – continues to speak offensively against the US.

The battered Jordan that mobilized in our favor along with other Muslim countries is one of the reasons that the Iranian attack failed. Still, the prime minister tweeted, “We intercepted, we learned. Together we will win.” No thanks to any other player who came to our aid.

Israel managed to prevent an unprecedented attack by Iran against Israel. It did this thanks to two elements: its technological and scientific strength that enabled the development of defense tools and a defense coalition consisting of several countries that militarily aided Israel.

Israel has a strategic opportunity to create a regional strategic alliance that can generate economic, political, and military pressure on Iran without Israel having to be in the arena alone. 

Political work, high-level foreign relations, harnessing partners, and diplomatic work are required here – exactly the opposite of what our government has to offer.

When a convicted minister tweets “dardale” (slang for “lame”) regarding an attack against Iran that Israel has yet to confirm it had conducted, you know we have a problem.

The State of Israel currently needs to emphasize expertise in foreign relations and security, not only in response but also in warfare.

In order to move forward, in order to fix, we have to stop destroying.

We need to recognize the good that international alliances provide, we need to free ourselves from the concepts of invincibility and make a real effort to improve, we need to integrate more diverse population groups into the leadership, including women, to increase perspectives and representation.

We need to restore the public’s trust in the leadership. We need elections.

The writer is an Israeli women’s rights activist, lecturer, social activist, strategist, and media personality. She is among the initiators of the coalition of women’s organizations and the founder of Building an Alternative (Bonot Alternativa).