They don't stop coming, the name of the victims. Names that until yesterday were not familiar to us and now appear as a painful story, along with pictures showing an innocent smile, about a traffic ending and a family broken apart forever. If that description reminds you of war, it's because that is exactly what it is: a war. But in this war, Israel chooses to hold its fire against the forces of evil and allow more and more casualties.
The women murdered by their partners in Israel – as since March there have been 17 – are not only victims of a wrong choice, of tough life conditions, or ignoring red flags. They are first and foremost the victims of an institutional system that has never bothered to give them tools with which to battle their hardships, and has never thrown them a lifeline – not at any point during their frightening journey, which ended bitterly. They are the victims of a reality to which we have become accustomed, in which violence against women is a norm that no longer shocks anyone, and doesn't alert a responsible leadership that believes that the problem is serious and painful enough to bother fighting for, or diverting budget funds to combat, or start – after 70 years – taking seriously.
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The murder of a women usually begins with verbal violence, "little" smacks, or veiled hints. Events like that happen in Israel once every few minutes. The root of the problem is that only 60 of these a day are reported to the police. Of those, only a handful will become indictments, and a tiny number will see the attackers put in prison. And this is the rule: violence that is not handled powerfully and with determination does not fade away – it increases, and quickly becomes more extreme.
The response from our leadership must be the national plan to combat violence against women, a plan that was approved by the cabinet back in 2017 but was never implemented. It requires very little funding, the equivalent of about one-tenth the cost of a submarine, and doesn't come close to the billions invested in Israeli society and the economy since the outbreak of the COVID crisis. The virus that is wreaking havoc is another reason why we must not dawdle in handling the pressure cooker that has been created, which only accelerates potential violent outbursts within the family. Cases of domestic violence have spiked by several hundred percent, as have calls to domestic violence hotlines, but the women and children in trouble still have to deal with a system that cannot help them, and might not be interested in helping.
This is the time to take action. Just like we are helping the unemployed, and small businesses, and the self-employed, and hospitals. This is the time to seek results, rather than just expressing solidarity and saying kind words. This is the time to make decisions and lead the change, because since you started to read this oped, two more women in Israel have been the targets of violence, and even as we speak, another murder is brewing somewhere.
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