Monday, May 08, 2006

Making the same mistake again

During the vote on approving the new government we have witnessed a first rebellion in the Kadima party. MK Marina Solodkin boycotted the vote in protest of total lack representation of Russian speaking community in the government.

M. Solodkin (Solodkina in Russian pronunciation) is in the 6-th place in the Kadima list, but was left out of the government or any of the important committees, despite the fact that the post of Minister of Absorption was promised to her by Ariel Sharon before his stroke. Instead MK Zeev Boyim got the"job", who is a the 10-th place in the Kadima party. By her words it is
an insult to an entire community.

Leaving the possibility that M. Solodkin has personal considerations in this matter, it is obvious that there is something wrong in this picture. The "coincidence" that the only Russian speaking MK, that is in a real position to get a ministerial post, is stepped over in favor of someone in the lover position, is to the very least strange. It isn't just her, quoting MK Nathan Sheranski
it isn't the first case when "Russians" were promised a lot and got nothing.

Generally I'm not of the kind of people who cries out "we are discriminated" all the time, but in this case I feel that I must speak up. I feel danger to Israeli society. The fact the largest community in Israel feels discriminated, could have grave results in the future. Continuing ignoring their, our interests will backfire at our government.

Our country still pays for the mistakes Israeli government made when treating the immigrants from the Arab countries. History is rarely wrong, it would be unwise to ignore it's lessons. Sadly our government is making the same mistake again.

Nathan, the author the "Faith in Nathan" blog, has wondered, how "very highly intelligent people know that Lieberman is hopelessly corrupt" could vote for him.
Leaving Mr. Lieberman's virtues and sins apart, PM Olmert just handed him a winning ace. Next time, even if it would be proven that he is corrupt, people will still vote for him, because he will be THEIR corrupt representative. Actually, the corruption charges against MK Lieberman are interesting too, since in 8 years the police has done nothing neither to convict him nor close the investigation, but somehow it all surfaces in the media in proximity to every passing elections.

4 comments:

Irina Tsukerman said...

They are able to do this, because even if they snub Russian-speaking candidates, and the community in general, they don't suffer any political consequences. In other words, the Russian-speaking lobby is clearly not strong enough to put enough pressure on them.

Woland said...

They will have. They are building this lobby with their own hands, and they will be sorry for it later.
The fact that there is no such lobby says about the high level of the integration of this community into the society. It would be a mistake to try and reverse the process. Nobody will gain from it.

Avi said...

I hate to say but had Ms. Solidikin gotten the ministry, it would just mean more beaucracy and more non-Jewish immigration (over 80% of aliya from the FSU is not Jewish at this point). While it was bad politically, unfortunately the Russians (particularly those who came late-90s and later) have brought a lot of problems to an Israel which already had enough problems.

Woland said...

I'm really sorry that you think that way.
I don't fancy Ms. Solodkin very much either, but lets take her out of the discussion.
I may agree about those who come now, that many of them are not Jewish, but saying that "the Russians (particularly those who came late-90s and later) have brought a lot of problems to an Israel which already had enough problems" is untrue, unfair and something else, you know what.