This week I went on a tour with other regional and local council heads from the north to visit our counterparts in Ashkelon, Netivot, Kiryat Malachi and Ashdod. We had an opportunity to get a small taste of what the dear residents of southern Israel face. We came to offer our support and we came away invigorated. Regional council heads preside over the local operations with authority. They are the first to go into the field with emergency rescue services while coordinating efforts with the IDF Homefront Command. Each excursion out into the field dictates the next set of priorities: to closely follow everything that requires repairing and quickly fixing it and to ensure that the residents don't feel neglected, not even for a moment. Coordination with the fire department, police and first aid services has been exemplary. I wouldn't be exaggerating if I said that regional council heads have essentially functioned as internal heads of state in Israel. Their daily routine combines setting policy while also tending to the smallest details, even on the most basic levels. We came to help the regional authorities assemble and organize all of the problems they are facing and present them in an organized fashion to the various government ministries. We wanted to help maintain, if only slightly, some semblance of normalcy in people's daily lives. We worked in conjunction with several public service agencies to send children and residents to cities outside of rocket range for rest and relaxation. We arranged for musicians to perform in bomb shelters and we produced a special festival for the children of the south. It has been perfect civic cooperation. We have a strong and resilient homefront, a strategic asset for the State of Israel that provides maneuverability to the operational echelons. This is the message, starting with the regional council heads, and passed onward to others. I ask now that we look ahead to the day the fighting stops, so we can leverage the superb teamwork between local authorities, the IDF, rescue services, government ministries and other organizations. As someone who has been the head of a community on the front lines of missile attacks, I know how upsetting the sound of a door slamming shut can be. Every car alarm is a reminder and there are so many little things that take people back to "those days." When this is over, local municipality leaders will be left to deal, on a daily and even hourly basis, with the residents' scars as they attempt to return life back to normal as quickly as possible. Therefore, it is the duty of all involved to continue operating in complete synchronization, as they have done during the fighting, so that everyone can do their job. The welfare of Israeli citizens is of the foremost importance for us all. Other local authority heads and many residents, who have left the south to get some peace and quiet elsewhere, have told me that their main concern at the moment pertains to the day after the fighting stops. We are successfully withstanding the rockets because of local authorities' leadership. They are heroically protecting their residents, both physically and by providing peace of mind, and it is the future duty of all agencies to continue to work together and ensure that we are also successful in dealing with the aftermath. Only by doing so will we be able to look back at Operation Pillar of Defense and say we were strong enough. At the time these words were written, news outlets were reporting that a cease-fire agreement was in the works. I'm confident that the government will make the right choices that will serve the country's interests, namely to ensure quiet for its southern residents and remove the missile threat from the center of the country. These days of fighting highlight the importance of peace and dialogue. Meanwhile, we can only hope to take what we have learned in this time of crisis and implement it in our daily lives afterward. The writer is the mayor of Maalot-Tarshiha and chairman for the Union of Local Authorities.
A synchronized homefront
מערכת ישראל היום
מערכת "ישראל היום“ מפיקה ומעדכנת תכנים חדשותיים, מבזקים ופרשנויות לאורך כל שעות היממה. התוכן נערך בקפדנות, נבדק עובדתית ומוגש לציבור מתוך האמונה שהקוראים ראויים לעיתונות טובה יותר - אמינה, אובייקטיבית ועניינית.
