CABINET COMMUNIQUE
(Communicated by the Cabinet Secretariat)
At the weekly Cabinet meeting today (Sunday), 28.9.08:
1. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert made the following remarks:
"Late last Wednesday night, a bomb was planted that lightly wounded Israel
Prize laureate Prof. Ze'ev Sternhell, one of Israel's foremost scientists,
with an international reputation. Over the years, Prof. Sternhell has been
known for his statements in which he takes a well-defined, sharp and
uncompromising political line, in which he believes, and there are many
others in the State of Israel who support this line. Whoever planted the
bomb in order to injure Prof. Sternhell did so in order, perhaps, to kill
him.
It is impossible not to see a direct line between the murder of Emil
Grunzweig, the awful murder of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and the attack
on Prof. Sternhell, which happily left him alive, albeit lightly wounded.
It is impossible not to see a link between these events which have occurred
over the years.
An evil wind of extremism, of hatred, of malice, of violence, of running
amok, of breaking the law, of contempt for the institutions of the state is
blowing through certain sections of the Israeli public and threatens Israeli
democracy, the ability of those entrusted by the State of Israel to make
decisions and the ability to freely express one's views without fear of
being attacked by wild, violent law-breakers, who disregard all frameworks
of proper, democratic life. The security services have been instructed to
deal with this instance, to investigate it, and to act with the greatest
possible speed in order to bring those responsible - for what seems like
another underground - to justice, so that they might be punished for this
awful thing that they have done. On behalf of the Government, I send wishes
for a quick recovery to Prof. Ze'ev Sternhell and wish him long life with
his family, friends and the entire Jewish People in the New Year. He should
not fear to express his views and his positions which he believes in,
whether people agree with him or not."
2. The Deputy Director of the Israel Security Agency briefed ministers on
current security matters.
3. Central Bureau of Chief Statistics ( http://tinyurl.com/3muofb ) Chief
Statistician Prof. Shlomo Yitzhaki briefed ministers on the recently
released Statistical Abstract of Israel for 2008
( http://tinyurl.com/3mg5xr ) and presented various key figures. See
http://tinyurl.com/4l38w5 and http://tinyurl.com/4y4vxy for further
details.
In commenting on Prof. Yitzhaki's remarks, Prime Minister Olmert said: "I
would like to inform you that the population of the State of Israel numbers
approximately 7,337,000 citizens, of which 5,542,000 are Jews. A majority
of the rest is Arabs and the remainder is Druze and Circassians. Ours is a
very young population, one of the youngest in the world. 28.4% of Israelis
are 14 and under, in comparison to an average of 17% in other western
countries. 9.8% of Israelis are 65 and over, as compared to almost 15% in
other countries. The number of children in Israel continued to increase in
2007 and now numbers 3.8 million. 151,679 children were born in the State
of Israel in 2007, a 2.4% increase over 2006. 18,129 immigrants came to
Israel in 2007. Half of the Jewish population is concentrated in only 27.8%
of the country, a very high population concentration. The vision of this
Government, and - I am convinced of the next one, as well - is that of
population dispersion, dealing with the peripheral areas and populating the
Negev with hundreds of thousands of Israelis in order to exhaust the great
potential for development and prosperity which the State of Israel may
expect from such a step."
4. Justice Minister Prof. Daniel Friedmann referred to a 26.9.08 Ha'aretz
article, which featured remarks by Israel Police Inspector-General Dudi
Cohen. Prime Minister Olmert recommended that Public Security Minister Avi
Dicter reprimand Israel Police Insp.-Gen. Cohen over his remarks.
5. The Government recalled Prime Minister Olmert's 22.6.08 speech to the
Jewish Agency Board of Governors ( http://tinyurl.com/48uaun ), discussed
Israel-Diaspora relations and decided - inter alia - that Prime Minister
Olmert and Jewish Agency Chairman Ze'ev Bielski would establish a steering
committee to deepen ties between the State of Israel and Diaspora Jewish
communities. The committee will - inter alia - formulate a plan to
strengthen Jewish identity in the Diaspora as well as ties between the State
of Israel and Diaspora Jewish communities. See http://tinyurl.com/4l38w5
for further details.
6. The Government discussed the establishment of a new community in the Iron
area. See http://tinyurl.com/4l38w5 for further details.
7. The Government marked Prime Minister Olmert's 63rd birthday. See
http://tinyurl.com/4l38w5 for further details.
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