Israeli Mayors Say Netanyahu ‘Failed Us’

Sunday’s massive attack in which 350 Hezbollah missiles and rockets pounded Israeli cities, towns, settlements and military bases created much anger among the Israeli public who are now blaming the extrmist government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu being responsible for what is happening.

Haifa Mayor Yona Yahav said, Sunday, the city is suffering from a very difficult economic situation after shops were closed due to Hezbollah missiles.

Yahav added to the Hebrew channel, i24 News, he has gone to the Knesset  to explain to its members of the exceedingly difficult situation in the city.

He explained “the Finance Committee in the Knesset and the Israeli state do not understand or know the terrible and dangerous events taking place in Haifa, as the city has been continually targeted on a daily basis, the economy is collapsing and the city is economically stagnant after the shops shutdown.”

Hezbollah is intensifying its targeting of the Israeli city, which includes important military and economic facilities, in addition to targeting the Krayot settlements near Haifa Bay, which resulted in much material losses, fires and human injuries.

Also, In central Israel, Petah Tikva Mayor Rami Greenberg said psychologists were deployed in the city after a rocket was fired from Lebanon. Hebrew radio station FM 103 quoting Greenberg as saying: “Social workers are deployed at the site of the Lebanese missile’s fall.”

Greenberg explained that whilst “the injuries are moderate and light, these specialists are providing the necessary answers to ease the burden on the settlers, as a result of the successive Lebanese missiles falling on their heads.”

On Sunday, the escalation was at its highest with over 500 sirens going off all over the north and center Israel where Tel Aviv itself was hit 17 times with missiles.

Greenberg’s statements come as Channel 12 reported two Israelis were injured, one of them moderately, as a result of a missile fired from Lebanon falling on a building in the settlement of Petah Tikva, whilst air traffic at the Ben Gurion International Airport in Tel Aviv, central Israel, was halted.

The official Israeli Broadcaster, Kan,  published a video clip showing the extensive destruction of a building in Petah Tikva, after it was directly hit by a missile, which led to a fire.

Security Failure

In the same context, Ronen Marley, the mayor of Nahariya in northern Israel, said, Sunday, Tel Aviv had failed to provide security for its citizens, and had wasted huge sums of money from its budget to no avail.

The same radio station quoted Marley as saying “the state of Israel has failed to provide security for its residents, as it previously wasted huge budgets to evacuate residents of the south (adjacent to the Gaza Strip).” He described Israel’s decision to evacuate the population as “stupid,” explaining that government had recorded a “disastrous failure” in this regard.

Over four million people spend their time down the underground shelters, double the number that took to hiding on a regular basis in the last months.

CrossFireArabia

CrossFireArabia

Dr. Marwan Asmar holds a PhD from Leeds University and is a freelance writer specializing on the Middle East. He has worked as a journalist since the early 1990s in Jordan and the Gulf countries, and been widely published, including at Albawaba, Gulf News, Al Ghad, World Press Review and others.

Related Posts

Israel Kills Journalist and His Family in Gaza

Journalist Mohammad Saleh Al Baradawil, his wife and children, were killed in the early morning hours of   Tuesday morning as Israeli occupation planes targeted his flat in Khan Younis, south of the Gaza Strip.

Sources point out that Israeli planes targeted the apartment of the journalist and his family in the Emirates neighborhood in West Khan Younis where additional martyrs and injured were reported.

Baradawil is the third journalist to have been assassinated after Israel resumed its genocidal war on Gaza on 18 March, 2025 after the end of the first stage of the ceasefire agreement reached with the Israeli government.

The latest killing brings the number of Palestinian journalists targeted by Israel at 209.

With American support Israel is carrying out a genocidal war on the Gaza Strip it started soon after 7 October, 2023 with the number of those killed standing at 164,000, mostly women and children while 14,000 still buried under the rubble in the Gaza Strip.

Continue reading
‘Its as Bad as Ever in Gaza’ – UN Workers

Lifesaving supplies in Gaza continue to run dangerously low, nearly four weeks into the total aid blockade and deadly bombardment of the enclave by Israel, UN humanitarians said on Friday.

According to local health authorities in Gaza, 830 people were killed between 18-23 March, including 174 women and 322 children. A further 1,787 were injured.

“The acts of war that we see bear the hallmarks of atrocity crimes,” said Jens Laerke, spokesperson for the UN aid coordination office, OCHA. “Hundreds of children and other civilians have been killed in health and Israeli airstrikes. Intensely populated areas hospitals are once again battlegrounds; patients killed in their beds, ambulances shot at, and first responders killed.”

It has been 10 days since Gazans woke up to renewed Israel bombing, abruptly ending the two-month ceasefire.

“It has been 10 days of witnessing – because the UN remains on the ground in Gaza – a callous disregard for human life and dignity,” Mr. Laerke maintained.

No to evacuations

Maryse Guimond, UN Women Representative for the Occupied Palestinian Territory, relayed testimonies of Palestinians in Gaza who say they will not heed new evacuation orders issued by the Israeli military, on the grounds that “there are no safe places anyway”.

Speaking from Amman, she added: “It is a situation of pure survival and survival of their families because, as they say, there is simply nowhere to go…”

“As a woman recently said to us from Deir al Balah, ‘My mother says death is the same whether in Gaza City, or in Deir al Balah; we just want to return to Gaza.’”

Echoing those concerns, Dr. Margaret Harris, spokesperson for the UN World Health Organization (WHO) said that the situation “is as bad as it ever was”. A new ceasefire is needed immediately for the sake of all Gazans, she insisted.

“We knew it was bad before the ceasefire, when we were constantly begging to be allowed to do our job just to help the ordinary people. No, they can’t keep going.”

Healthcare in the enclave is also suffering from the aid blockade, with supplies dwindling dangerously low since the cut-off began on 2 March.

“The key supplies now for safe labour and delivery…will be running out soon,” said Dr Rik Peeperkorn, WHO representative in the OPT.

A dozen ambulances have also been put out of action through lack of fuel, the veteran humanitarian medic said, speaking from Jerusalem.

Collective punishment warning

Sparked by Hamas-led terror attacks in Israel, the war in Gaza has devastated the enclave and prompted widespread international condemnation over its impact on civilians, who should be spared from violence in times of war.

Nothing can justify the collective punishment of the Palestinian people,” OCHA’s Mr. Laerke insisted.

“International law is clear, it prohibits indiscriminate attacks, obstruction of life saving aid, destruction of infrastructure indispensable for civilian survival and hostage-taking.

“The International Court of Justice’s provisional measures on the application of the Genocide Convention remain in place; yet the alerts that we issue in report after report reveal an utter lack of respect for the most basic principles of humanity.”

UN News

Continue reading

You Missed

Burning Muslim Civilization

Burning Muslim Civilization

Israel Kills Journalist and His Family in Gaza

Israel Kills Journalist and His Family in Gaza

‘Its as Bad as Ever in Gaza’ – UN Workers

‘Its as Bad as Ever in Gaza’ – UN Workers

Thank You Annie

Thank You Annie