Two trucks carrying humanitarian aid set to be delivered to residents of the Gaza Strip were set on fire Monday at the Tarqumiyah border crossing in the West Bank.
The trucks were part of a convoy that was blocked and looted by Israeli right-wing activists. As usual in Israel, no one took any responsibility. The police and the army blamed each other. When National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir – who is in charge of the police – publicly opposes the transfer of humanitarian aid into Gaza.
The police have been hostile towards hostages' families and anti-government protesters during demonstrations on Tel Aviv's Kaplan Street; therefore, we shouldn't be surprised when they are weak in the face of right-wing protesters blocking aid trucks heading to Gaza, emptying them of their cargo and even torching one.
Activists from the far-right "Tzav 9" group are the ones responsible for blocking the aid trucks. Just last week, the group and its supporters blocked aid trucks heading from Jordan to Gaza from passing through the southern town of Mitzpe Ramon for six hours until the police cleared them from the road.
A senior security official who spoke to Haaretz said that the police "turn a blind eye to disturbances of order by lawbreakers who vandalize and burn aid, assisted by inside information about the trucks' movement." He added that "there are people within the police force who avoid handling and preventing such disturbances, and when they do, they do it with a demonstrable lack of interest. There's a feeling that they are trying to please someone specific in the government."
The government and the prime minister's weakness in the face of extreme right-wing cabinet members encourages extremist activists to sabotage the delivery of humanitarian aid, and – by doing so – subvert Israeli policy.
This is what a dysfunctional country looks like: The political echelon, in coordination with the Biden administration, decides that aid trucks should enter Gaza. Israel's defense establishment coordinates the move, but the police are unable to secure the convoy and stop the right-wing protesters from preventing Israel from carrying out its own policy. Or maybe this is actually Israel's new policy?
This weakness – justifiably – drew diplomatic rebukes for Israel, further harming the country's global status. "It's a total outrage that there are people who are attacking and looting these convoys coming from Jordan going to Gaza to deliver humanitarian assistance," said U.S. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan.
"We're also raising our concerns at the highest level of the Israeli government. It's something we make no bones about – we find it completely and utterly unacceptable," he said. Sullivan added that the Biden administration is "looking at the tools" it has to respond to this. In other words, the United States is examining how it can do the Israel Police's work for them.
Israel's inability to ensure the safe passage of aid trucks to the hundreds of thousands of Palestinians in Gaza is further evidence of the government's incompetence and its leader, Benjamin Netanyahu. It degrades Israel, politically and morally.
The above article is Haaretz's lead editorial, as published in the Hebrew and English newspapers in Israel.