Eitan Davidi, mayor of the northern Israel town of Margaliot, criticized the ceasefire agreement with Lebanon this morning (Thursday), claiming it jeopardizes the northern residents.
“This is a scandalous agreement, we never imagined reaching a day where we’d have to sign such an agreement and return home under these conditions,” Davidi said in an interview with 103FM.
He added, “We have seen Hezbollah observing us for many years, targeting us for attacks. We thought we were going to war; I said all along we would give the government all the time needed to resolve the situation in the south, bring back the hostages, and return us home safely. We consistently demanded that the distance between us and the Hezbollah villages in Lebanon be extended to 2-3 km. Everyone, including the military, told us this proximity couldn’t continue.”
Davidi directed his frustration towards the government. “This isn’t an inevitability; we could have crushed them more. I’ve been in those villages too. The Israeli government is ruining everything. So why did we invade Lebanon? To destroy? What’s our victory in the north? How many terrorists we killed, or how many towns we destroyed? Our victory is that residents can return home safely. And if everyone says they don’t feel safe going back and they don’t want to return, what does that say to the Israeli government?”
“I don’t trust the Prime Minister with anything he does; everything he touches fails,” he stated. “He says ‘we’ll respond to every violation,’ but in 18 years, 14 of them under Netanyahu, we’ve bought time and peace at a steep price. We needed a buffer zone that would have provided us peace. The government didn’t deliver that. The situation is leading to the fourth Lebanon war and the dismantling of towns in the north. In the next two years, they won’t maintain their character. I urge the northern residents — don’t return. They’re sending us like sheep to the slaughter,” he concluded.
From Arutz Sheva, here.