Editorial, January 21, 2011
Labour Pains
SOMEHOW, some way, we all knew this was coming. Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak, who had been battling with a rebellion within his own party since the moment he accepted an agreement that would lead Labour into Likud leader Binyamin Netanyahu’s Government, on Monday finally packed up and started his own faction – Atzmaut (Independence) – together with four other Labour MKs.
Was it accurate for Barak to compare his moves with those of Ariel Sharon and Shimon Peres – who left the Likud and Labour to form Kadima in 2005 at a time when Sharon’s Gaza disengagement plan was tearing his party apart? Were there truly parallels, as Barak suggested, between his split and that of David Ben-Gurion and Shimon Peres yet again, who left Mapai in 1965 to form Rafi over deep-seated ideological disagreements?
In truth, Barak’s departure lacked the hallmarks of either split. There is no sweeping policy issue at stake today that compares to the controversial disengagement plan that ushered Sharon out of the Likud. Nor is Barak’s action linked to any great ideological schism, like the one that led to the merger of Mapai and Ahdut HaAvoda – the first Labour alignment – that Ben-Gurion so strenuously opposed.
Even so, Opposition Leader Tzipi Livni should know better than to describe Barak’s move as “the dirtiest act” in Israeli political history. In the free-spirited forum that is the Knesset, there has been far worse treachery. Dramas aside, what we are seeing is nothing more than an act of political survival.
Labour’s dysfunction was open for all to see, and it was rooted in the inherent contradictions within the party itself. Its rebel MKs could not be faulted for holding Barak’s feet to the fire for agreeing to stay in a coalition that was not making progress for peace. At the same time, Barak could justifiably point fingers at the vocal minority within the Labour Party, which had never accepted the legitimate internal party vote that had approved Labour’s entry into the coalition in the first place. At the end of the day, Barak’s divorce from the Labour Party was not so much based upon ideological differences as irreconcilable ones.
The bloom off his rose, and with no chance of healing the rifts, Barak had been left with little option but to find a new home in the Knesset where he could lead a party in his own image, and in peace.
Answering the call
FROM soap to skateboards, from toothbrushes to toilet paper, from puzzles to perfume … just minutes after The AJN hit the newsstands last week, the collection boxes for our Toys & Toiletries appeal began to fill up, as readers rallied to show their support for Queenslanders beleaguered by the floods that have ravaged the state. In the days that followed, thousands of dollars worth of goods were delivered to our door – far more than could be packed into a single van.
A little inconvenient perhaps for the fantastic team from Chabad of Rural and Regional and Australia (RARA), who had to make more than one journey to our offices to collect all the boxes, but testament to the unbounded compassion and limitless generosity of a community that knows only too well how the smallest act of kindness can shed a ray of light in the darkest of times.
Of course, our appeal – run in conjunction with Chabad of RARA and Our Big Kitchen in Sydney – was just one of a number of campaigns launched by Australian Jewry to bring vital relief to those whose homes have been destroyed by the deluge. Jewish Aid Australia, the Queensland Jewish Board of Deputies, B’nai B’rith, Jewish Care Victoria, Jewish House in Sydney, as well as Chabad of RARA and Our Big Kitchen, have all answered the call with their own initiatives, whether collecting goods, raising money, preparing food parcels, arranging concerts or sending teams of people to Queensland to distribute aid and just help out in whatever way they can.
Individuals and businesses among us have also risen to the challenge. Catering companies Passion8 in Sydney and Passionate in Melbourne have sent meals north to those in need. Cairns couple Ken and Lee Miller abandoned their holiday to help Rockhampton residents mop up. Sydneysider Ilan Lowbeer, an ambulance volunteer, headed north to lend a hand in Brisbane. Retired Victorian Supreme Court judge Howard Nathan boarded a fire truck to help evacuate neighbours stranded on properties in central Victoria, where flooding also hit homes this week.
The floods have brought death and misery in their wake. But they have also brought out the best in Australians and Australian Jewry. Thank you to all those who answered our call, and indeed all the appeals that will bring comfort and hope in the days, weeks and months ahead.
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