The treasury is using a "divide and conquer" approach with the single mothers, Vicki Knafo, the single mothers' representative, told Israel Radio on Monday. Knafo was referring to a decision made by several of the protesting mothers to leave the Jerusalem protest site after they met with Finance Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday night.
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Indeed, there has been some conflict brewing within the protest camp. Some of the women have accused Knafo of representing her own personal interests rather than those of single mothers in general. Others have said that Knafo - who sparked the protest by walking from Mitzpeh Ramon in the south to Jerusalem more than a week ago - does not have the skills to conduct the struggle.
Meanwhile, a counter-demonstration took place in Jerusalem to support the economic plan while about 40 Jewish and Arab single mothers marched Monday from Jaffa to Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's nearby Tel Aviv office to demonstrate solidarity with the single mothers' struggle, according to radio reports.
"We've come to demonstrate in favor of the economic plan, which we think will heal the economy and pull it out of the situation it's in," one of the counter-demonstrators told Israel Radio. "Unfortunately, instead of going out to work, [the single mothers] march hundreds of kilometers to get here," she said.
Knafo responded by calling their point of view "legitimate," but said the counter-demonstrators were "violent." She said she invited them to the protest tents outside the Finance Ministry for coffee and cake and "they hit us."
Orlev meets with Netanyahu on alternative plan Minister of Labor and Social Affairs Zevulun Orlev (National Religious Party) met with Netanyahu on Monday to discuss an alternative plan to the reduction of income supplement allowances, and then met with the single mothers, Army Radio reported.
Orlev had planned to hold a press conference Sunday to present an alternative plan to the reduction of income supplement allowances, but Sharon instructed him to cancel it. The prime minister said the press conference was unnecessary and that holding it would be a "grave mistake."
Sharon told his cabinet Sunday that he supports Netanyahu's plan to solve the plight of single mothers faced with cuts in their income allowances and "won't cave in" to the mothers. In the weekly cabinet meeting, Netanyahu reiterated his position that single mothers must join the work force.
Single moms ask Bush to intervene in their plight Vicki Knafo and the leaders of the single mothers' protest movement wrote to U.S. President George Bush on Sunday, pleading with him to help annul the cuts in their state benefits introduced by Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's government.
"The struggle of the single mothers, both Jewish and Arab, is no less critical or existential than the hudna [cease-fire] and the security condition," they wrote in the letter to Bush.
Knafo said Monday morning that the mothers want Bush to persuade Sharon to drop the budget cuts that affect single-mother families. She told Army Radio that it's appropriate to involve Bush because he should monitor "where the money that he sends here is going," saying, "It could be that some of it is supposed to go to sinlge-parent families."
The letter to Bush predicted a social disaster. "The policy led by Sharon's government is bringing about a social disaster that will affect many generations; striking at the mothers is hurting the children - the next generation's ability to advance and productively contribute to society," they wrote, expressing hope that Bush would pressure Sharon to change his mind on the cuts during Sharon's upcoming visit to Washington
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