Egozi’s Fury – Shooting Passenger Trains

Egozi’s Fury – Shooting Passenger Trains

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Here is an investigation that should be given top priority: The police must establish quickly and with certainty who shot and hit a train riding near Lod last week.

Dozens of passengers were aboard the train during the shooting, but fortunately none suffered injuries. The police checked whether this was a stray shooting from a wedding taking place in the areas, but attendees denied it.

In both cases this event is very serious – if it was a “joyous” shooting, as one might call it, then we must put at end to this crazy habit of expressing joy by shooting in the air. If this was an intentional act by hostile persons, it means the situation has escalated greatly, which requires a whole different manner of treatment.

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In Europe some of the countries are starting to realize what is happening and what will happen should they keep their gates wide open to the wave of refugees from Arab states.

The refugees’ problem is serious from a humanitarian perspective, but it is already revealing aspects of radical nationalism – waving ISIS flags and threatening non-Muslims in the countries receiving them. And this is just the beginning. Europe is starting to realize, a little too late, that sitting on its backside while a mass slaughter is taking place for years in Syria and parts of Iraq does not keep the problem far from the supposedly quiet and safe European home.

The recognition comes a little late, after waves of refugees have already arrived at some countries in Europe, and many more are still to come.

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The resolute announcement by Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu on aggressive measures to be taken against stones and Molotov bottles throwers in Jerusalem was to be expected. In displays like these the government sure knows what it’s doing. Arriving in an armored vehicle to the scene, where military and police officers await, one of them handing Netanyahu binoculars to watch over the “battlefield”.

It photographs really well, but it is no longer impressive. We’ve seen these “displays of purpose” dozens of times, wherever a military problem arose in Israel, but that is where it ends.

After the resolute declarations, the process of “non-applying” begins. Someone says there isn’t enough manpower, some legal consultant jumps up and says that shooting small caliber weapons at the knees of those throwing stones and burning bottles isn’t legal and so on. And that is where it ends until the next media round. Remember the Supertanker during the great fire on Carmel Mountain? The method is still going on – showcase decision with nothing behind them.

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This is more than worrying: The status of Israel in the world, which reached an all-time low, is not just a matter of feeling. This status is affecting one on the main fields of export – the defense industry. Markets that were traditionally almost completely governed by Israeli defense industries – are no longer so.

The lack of an Israeli foreign policy combined with the technological and marketing efforts by other countries are taking a bite out of the Israeli defense industries’ traditional markets.

It’s a traditional process for two reasons – weapon deals create special relationship between the seller and the buyer, and the other reason is the substantial loss of income.

But Israel keeps on going without as much as a shred of a clear foreign policy, which is why this deterioration will only continue.

 

Arie Egozi iHLS editor-in-chief
Arie Egozi
iHLS editor-in-chief