As Jews commemorated Passover, Industry and Trade Minister Natan Sharansky captured the relief of many Israelis in the wake of a high-level corruption scandal when he quipped they had “come out of Egypt” once again.
After prosecutors determined they lacked sufficient evidence to indict Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for fraud and breach of trust, some Israelis are marking this holiday week more aggressively.
Yossi Sarid, the left-wing Meretz Party leader who filed one of five appeals of that decision with Israel’s High Court, compared Netanyahu and his government to hametz and said they should be thrown out.
Before Passover, Jews clean house to remove all the hametz, Hebrew for foods that contain leavened wheat, oats, barley, rye, crumbs or any other products that have yeast in them.
The tradition harks back to the Jewish people’s escape from slavery in ancient Egypt. They are said to have left so quickly that their daily bread had no time to rise in ovens.
At their annual seder dinners Monday night, Israelis commemorated the Exodus from Egypt and slavery, and in prayer and song retold the story of their deliverance into freedom, drinking sweet red wine and eating traditional matzoh, a specially prepared unleavened bread.
The name Passover, Pesach in Hebrew, comes from the traditional story that first-born Jewish males were spared when Egyptian first-born males were killed in the 10th plague that Jews believe God imposed on Egypt for enslaving them.
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Many Israelis, like Sharansky, saw a holiday parallel with the scandal that mostly passed over Netanyahu this week, when Atty. Gen. Elyakim Rubinstein announced prosecutors would not press charges against the prime minister and Justice Minister Tsachi Hanegbi.
The shadow of the investigation into influence-peddling in a Netanyahu appointment lingered over the nation and was a topic of heated discussion at many
seders. Rubinstein’s report said that prosecutors were bewildered by Netanyahu’s decision to appoint a political crony as attorney general.
The appointee, Jerusalem lawyer Roni Bar-On, resigned after 24 hours amid criticism he was not qualified for the post.
Rubinstein found evidence to indict a senior member of Netanyahu’s Likud-led coalition, Shas Party leader Aryeh Deri, for trying illegally to influence the Bar-On appointment.
Many Israelis on the Right and Left agreed with Sharansky, head of the new immigrant Yisrael Ba-Aliyah Party, that “we have all come out of Egypt and now we need to see how we can get over this to return to governing.”
Those who share Netanyahu’s feeling that the scandal was sensationalized even include some voters who favored opposition Labor Party leader Shimon Peres, ousted as prime minister by Netanyahu in a close vote last May 29.
“We just feel relief,” said one such Israeli, Dr. David Amir, an orthopedic surgeon in Jerusalem who is satisfied justice was done on the eve of Passover. “But I have patients who voted for Netanyahu, too, who are also sad.
“I didn’t expect much. Like others, I feel they made a big deal out of this, but what is politics, anyway? I never thought it was so clean. Who is innocent completely, anyone? It was blown up out of proportion.”
The White House and Palestinians have sought to portray the affair as an internal Israeli matter, but PLO officials say that it has further frozen peace negotiations, which have been stalemated for weeks.
Israelis also celebrate Passover with the threat of violence hanging over their heads. Security forces went on high alert this week to guard against Palestinian unrest, terror or even more bombings.
As they gathered at seders re-reading their Haggadah, the book of prayers and songs retelling the Exodus, Jews in Israel read with familiar anxiety one particular annual passage:
“The same promise made to our ancestors holds true for us, for not just one enemy wanted to destroy us, but in every generation there are those who seek our destruction; but God saves us from their hands.”
Police have deployed extra troops at most public places to guard against attacks.
Despite that, Israelis and tourists enjoyed sunshine Tuesday, the first full day of their Passover vacations, and crowded the country’s beaches, parks, nature reserves and tourist spots.
Many held picnics, but the observant abstained from leavened products of any kind.