Israel’s Teachers Union on Wednesday night announced a teachers’ strike on Thursday following the government’s decision to uphold last week’s decision to end quarantine for students exposed to COVID despite health officials’ objections due to an increasing number of seriously ill pediatric COVID patients.
The chairman of the union, Yaffa Ben-David, instructed pre-school and elementary school teachers to stay at home on Thursday, issuing a statement saying: “In light of the government’s decision that exposes you to COVID and endangers your health, and following thousands of requests from you, protest measures will be carried out tomorrow – do not go to schools and pre-schools tomorrow.”
In an interview on Channel 12 News, Ben-David said: “The decision of the Prime Minister and Health Minister to cancel quarantine is appalling. They’re abandoning the teaching staff.”
The Education Ministry fought back by filing a petition to the Tel Aviv Labour Court for an emergency injunction against the strike. Later reports said that the court issued the injunction, stating that “the strike was announced only 11 hours prior to the start of the school day and did not leave enough time for the two parties to hold discussions on the issue.”
Classes on Thursday took place as scheduled (except in the north and in the Jerusalem and Gush Etzion areas where schools were canceled due to the snow).
Education Minister Yifat Shasha-Biton slammed Ben-David, saying “belligerent and political moves on the back of the children of Israel are inappropriate and unacceptable, certainly during such challenging times. This aggressive and unilateral behavior – not in our schools.”
(YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)
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One Response
Get over it.. let them strike and don’t pay them. So many Israelis have the shots and booster after booster and are still masking up are still getting sick. Time to go back to life… Israel government calls their own problem and you scare your whole nation for political game this is what you get now try to get out of the mess. Covid is like the the new flu