Leasing, not privatization

The media descriptions were exaggerated. The ministers and MKs who were absent from the vote for the privatization of Israeli lands did not want to cause Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's defeat. It was actually he - by warning that he would dismiss anyone who didn't vote in favor of the law during the revote - who behaved like a panic-stricken person who had suffered a defeat.

He also erred when he put the ministers in a position where they would be forced to vote against their consciences and in favor of the current version.

After all, now the prime minister knows that additional ministers and other MKs, including some of those closest to him, are also opposed to the present version but did not have the guts to abstain from the voting.

The vote to privatize state lands will have a significant influence on the economic and ethical character of the country, and Netanyahu was told even by ministers from his own party that it is inconceivable to submit it to a vote in a hasty, even panicky manner, without any possibility of making essential changes to it and preventing endless trouble in the future.

Netanyahu would do well to pay attention to the feelings of the absolute majority in the Knesset, including members of both the coalition and the opposition, Arabs and Jews. He must come to his senses and conduct a thorough discussion during the summer recess (by simulation, for example), with the participation of supporters and opponents - and experts.

The amended version of the law is likely to enjoy national consensus, since it touches on the very heart of the national experience. MK Otniel Schneller (Kadima) has already declared from the Knesset dais that if the clause about selling the land is changed to leasing, the Kadima faction will support the law.

A compromise proposal in this spirit, which is also supported by many Likud MKs and party members, states that the leasing would be renewed every 49 years, while formal ownership would remain in the hands of the state. The state could decide not to renew the leasing contract only in exceptional cases to be determined by law (such as a takeover by hostile groups, the transfer of a significant amount of land to non-Israeli groups, massive violations of planning and construction laws and the creation of monopolies and cartels).

If Netanyahu accepts these logical amendments, and in fact there is no reason why he shouldn't, the situation is likely to be reversed: Quite a number of opposition members, in addition to Kadima, will support the amended law.

When people claim that there was no public discussion, they of course blame the government. But the government has a partner in crime: the media. The intention to privatize Israeli lands was published in the context of the plan proposed by the Likud 100-day team, but the media remained silent.

Even in the two stormy weeks preceding the vote, the media continued to ignore the issue; they were even too lazy to report on the unique phenomenon - real news! - of the cooperation between the ethical left and the ethical right, which was without precedent and without political ego.

In the corridors of the Knesset, group after group of members of the Zionist youth movements, with their blue shirts, walked past the reporters; Hashomer Hatzair and Hanoar Haoved, Bnei Akiva and Mahanot Haolim.

These groups, alongside other ideological groups, created an ethical lobby that brought together polar opposites, so that the land would not be sold in perpetuity and would not be given - as in previous privatizations - to a small number of wealthy businessmen. They tried to convince reporters that a major surprise could be expected in the voting; that there was a big "story" here.

Nonsense, there won't be any surprises, a major television personality said, waving them off, and therefore there is no story here.

But after the vote, that man and his cynical colleagues did not hesitate to launch a venomous attack against Netanyahu, especially for not spotting in advance the huge coalition that had organized in the corridors to oppose the law, and for not postponing the vote until he achieved consensus at least in his cabinet and his party.