Finance Ministry officials are confused. They are walking the length and breadth of this unbearable crisis with the doctors as if they have received a legislative mandate to implement a national guillotine. But they have not received such a license. They are ravenous and furious, and perhaps they should approach Health Ministry Director-General Roni Gamzu -- whom they sought to fire -- to prescribe them a few tranquilizers. At a time when Justice Minister Yaakov Neeman can change the rules of the game after it has already started to fix the results ahead of the elections; and when the head of the Knesset Constitution Law and Justice Committee, MK David Rotem, literally waves his hammer at MK Zahava Gal-On and calls her "no less than a beast," anything goes. The Finance Ministry wants to dismiss Gamzu for not firing Rambam Medical Center's Deputy Director, Professor Shimon Reisner, because he did not lay off the 10 senior doctors who submitted resignations in support of the residents' strike. It's a perfect "Chad Gadya" (the Passover song, "One Little Goat") moment. As the Talmud says, there is "no punishment without prior warning." However, Finance Ministry officials, just like Neeman and Rotem, have no patience for proper management. Anyone who doesn't stop them will be consumed by them in disagreements and debates. All of this took place on Thursday at the same time that the ill-advised residents failed to heed the High Court of Justice's request to return to negotiations while also returning to work. Their refusal is the flip-side of brutal conduct, this time on the part of the doctors. Supreme Court President Justice Dorit Beinisch is not an enemy of the doctors, and the harsh but balanced criticism she leveled at them should lead them to do some soul-searching. They should ask themselves why the highest court of the land accused them of foul play by when it convened on Thursday. They might have an ulterior motive or a hidden agenda, which if proven, would destroy the legitimacy of their plight for improved conditions. If there was just one petition, Beinisch said, it would have been rejected entirely. In other words, the residents are accused of being two-faced and inconsistent. On one hand, they want to have the new wage agreement with the Finance Ministry expire earlier, but they also want to do away with the employee time clock introduced in the new agreement (which is necessary to ensure proper work ethics). But the High Court's ruling did leave a glimmer of hope. The justices ordered the residents to report back next week after they had a chance to "sleep on it." The residents now have the opportunity to comply with the judiciary. Namely, they can now adhere to the Labor Court's ruling by going back to work and entering meaningful negotiations. For all the hubris of the Finance Ministry officials, they are still guided by noble motives; they are the keepers of the state coffers and stand in the way of renegotiating costly collective wage agreements. If they give the doctors too much they will be swept by the tsunami that would certainly follow -- namely, a wholesale sellout of the norms governing other sectors in our economy. My diagnosis: Doctors should comply with court orders.
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