Three papers discuss the verdict in the trial of former president Moshe Katzav:
Yisrael Hayom refers to yesterday’s sentencing of former president Moshe Katsav and asserts that "Yesterday, Israel exemplified its being a country in which the supremacy of the rule of law has been upheld… In the end, the justice system worked as it should. There is what to be proud of. Israel is a nation of laws."
The Jerusalem Post discusses the sentencing yesterday of former president Moshe Katzav, and states: “The case of the former president provided the opportunity to make unequivocally clear, including via the news media, that no form of sexual harassment is acceptable, no matter who perpetrates it.”
Haaretz praises the verdict reached by the judges of former President Moshe Katzav, and notes that “Katsav’s mark of shame is a badge of honor for Israel.” The editor adds: “From here on, all senior officials will know that their job titles do not, in the words of the judges in the Katsav case, constitute a hunting license.”
Yediot Aharonot says that "IDF Southern Command made errors in judgment yesterday, both in deciding to use inexact weapons such as mortars in populated areas and in the way the mortars were employed. Similar mistakes were made in the past when use has been made of artillery fire, as a response, in proximity to civilians – and all the lessons are in Southern Command’s manuals. Now, after we apologized, we must prepare for the possibility that in the next stage Hamas will respond not with a mortar barrage on the area adjacent to the Gaza Strip, but with volleys of Grad rockets into Israel, which will oblige the IDF to ratchet up its response. They are bastards and we are playing into their hands." The author notes that we have been out of the headlines and says "Apparently, the IDF has decided – ahead of the party that international organizations are preparing for us over Gaza on the anniversary of the Mavi Marmara – to donate several more unnecessary pictures to those seeking to delegitimize Israel." The paper points out that "Last night, the IDF carried out a targeted elimination," and suggests that this was pursuant to an apparent Southern Command decision "that this is the right time to deal with Hamas’s failure to control the other organizations that are firing at Israel." The author asserts that "This was not another stage in an out-of-control deterioration, but clear testimony of a planned escalation. Since the IDF insists on being right at any price, the political leadership must be the smart one."
Ma’ariv discusses the on-going social workers’ strike and calls on Histadrut Chairman Ofer Eini not to abandon the social workers – "who enjoy wall-to-wall support" – because they rejected an agreement that he negotiated, on their behalf, with the Finance Ministry. The author calls for an immediate return to the negotiating table in an effort to make the rejected agreement more palatable.
[Alex Fishman, Yehuda Sharony and Dan Margalit wrote today’s articles in Yediot Aharonot, Ma’ariv and Yisrael Hayom, respectively.]