'Tent City' the phenomenon of makeshift tent encampments springing up all over Israel reached the orderly and tidy garden city of Karmiel in the beautiful Galil last week. One day there was a strip of neat grass dividing the municipality's main highway, Sderot Nesiei Israel (Boulevard of the Presidents of Israel) outside the 'Qanyon Chadash' (New Shopping Centre) and the next it had disappeared under half a dozen tents complete with protesters.
It's almost three weeks since these demonstrations began in Tel Aviv and it has now spread to around 40 towns and cities throughout the country. What do they want? Primarily it's about the soaring cost of living especially housing which the demonstrators want reducing. However Doctors' earnings, health, education and social welfare are now being dragged in. How much the government can do about prices in a free economy is a moot point but when the long hot summer is over and the chill winds of autumn are felt, the participants will surely disperse back to from whence they came. Still, they certainly have the attention of the government and who knows but it may have some benefit for Joe Public.
Meanwhile the words of Balaam, the pagan prophet employed to curse the Israelites but instead blessed them spring to mind. "Mah tovu ohalecha Ya'akov, mishkanotecha Yisrael". "How goodly are your tents O Jacob, your shrines O Israel."
