Summary of Editorials from the Hebrew Press 26th of July 2010

Ma’ariv relates to the opposition by the citizens of the Carmel to the laying of the gas pipeline, and states that "Utilization of natural gas is a national interest, many times bigger than the inherent interest of Carmel region’s citizens to transfer the problem to someone else’s back yard."
 
Yisrael Hayom declares that "Israel must make it clear that it is possible to enter goods into Gaza.  The UN, in its wisdom, – and to the anger of Hamas – proposed to those of goodwill to do so by land, either through Ashdod or through El-Arish.  But the organizers of the new flotilla are not of goodwill.  They do not want to do something good for the Palestinian population of Gaza, but rather to do evil to the state of the Jews."
 
The Jerusalem Post opines that as Shas and United Torah Judaism have rejected the proposal to a six-month moratorium on all legal and legislative action aimed at changing the religious status quo regarding conversions to Judaism, and have vowed to continue to back the conversion bill that would anchor in law the haredi-dominated Chief Rabbinate’s de facto control over conversions, the delegitimacy of non-Orthodox conversions, and the very Jewishness of all non-Orthodox converts, "Religious extremism and narrow parochialism have, for now, once again gotten the better of reason." As the question of ‘Who is a Jew’ has remained open since the establishment of the state, the editor feels that "If it is to be resolved, it must be through dialogue and compromise, not through coercion or unilateral acts."
 
Haaretz informs its readers that "The Supreme Court’s decision last week to double the prison term of a police officer who was convicted of killing a car thief elicited a verbal assault on the court from law enforcement figures, chief among them Public Security Minister Yitzhak Aharonovitch and Police Commissioner David Cohen." The editor declares that "The actual responses to the verdicts constitute defiance of the law and an undermining of the rule of law, the sole interpreter of which is the court. In a state that aspired to democratic life in which the rule of law is a critical value, the minister and police chief would now be ending their terms. "