It is Sunday morning, 20 Teves, and the clouds are moving aside to permit the sun to shine through, but the picture in Jerusalem is not a pleasant one, with wet garbage scattered in all directions following the weekend thundershowers.
Jerusalem Municipality employees have made good on their threat to launch a general strike Sunday morning following the announcement from Mayor Nir Barkat, that the city is laying off 2,150 workers due to a lack of national government funding. All city services have stopped. Sanitation workers however decided to preempt, announcing their strike on Thursday. Hence, the garbage had piled up before the weekend storm hit, exacerbating the situation considerably.
Afternoon daycare programs will continue until Monday, 28 Teves and then, parents will have to pay privately or remove their children from the programs. This will hurt chareidi families considerably as many have children in afternoon programs to permit wives to work.
Danny Bonfill, the Histadrut National Labor Federation leader in Jerusalem told the media he hopes Finance Minister Moshe Kahlon will find a way to meet with Mayor Barkat sooner, rather than later. Because of personal differences, the senior cabinet minister has not met with Barkat for over three years and refuses to do so.
In some schools, security guards are already absent due to firings and city-run sporting and cultural events for the remainder of the month have been canceled.
(YWN – Israel Desk, Jerusalem)
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3 Responses
And where is the flood of irate commenters venting their fury against these ungrateful municipal workers who are shutting down the city today? Maybe they’re not parasites, but they might be encouraging the spread of parasites — and rodents — by not collecting and disposing of the trash since Friday. Remember that this strike, like most others, is about MONEY, not about principles. While not condoning Peleg demos, it’s important to point out that if disrupting the city is wrong — then it’s wrong for everyone. But, if it’s OK to disrupt city life — it’s OK for everyone. Including Peleg.
why are the the city union heads working together with the mayor, has anyone seen entire floors of workerss in the main city hall building with workers of the union.
under chareidi mayors we didn’t have this craziness only under barkat where did all the money go, maybe on formula one Etc.?
one minute wasn’t kobi kachlon (moshe kachlon’s brother) part of barakat’s party number 2 man?
As of Sunday afternoon (Israel time), the strike has been called off and trash is being collected. So, although still true, there’s no point in publishing my initial comment on the strike.