Can anyone give a short performance report for the Ministry of Public Security? Just wondering whether a change in management will make any difference. I still think that there should be a greater use of drones to patrol the area and spot fires and firebugs.

And he gets to keep his job? What would it take to get him out?

It is political spin that they discussed this weeks ago - how convenient. Yishai must resign. There must be ministerial accountability in our democracy. Without that we are not a democracy.

.. using all his time to think up new ways to obstruct Israel to moving towards a peaceful, tolerant future?

He also refused the donation of fire engines because they were in part funded by Christians, never mind that the organization offering is primarily Jewish. He can take his orthodoxy and his bias and explain that to the families of the 41 killed in this Carmel fire.

how the government will try to whitewash everything...by taking away the fire department from shas...big f*ing deal...yeah...take away his fire trucks...that will teach him

Give that suggestion to the Ministry of Public Security!

Howard, the ministry used to be called the Ministry of Police. More info at http://www.mops.gov.il/BPEng/About+MOPS/ The problem is more a conceptual problem for Israelis, in that they understand to a limited extent the concept of "accountability" in the IDF, but pretty much nowhere else. The word doesn't even have a Hebrew equivalent. The plus side of the proposed move would be to put the fire service into a ministry where it would have a much higher priority and where the professional mission is for protection of society. The interior ministry is basically a tool of the biggest small party partner in any coalition government. It controls all sorts of things relating to the population, so Shas is attracted to it - and for the most part the fire service is right near the bottom of the priority list. So I personally the change if management will be good, however, the overall organization of the fire service and the way it is funded must be addressed. Either empower the local municipalities and give them adequate control (meaning they control their local fire department), or fund a national service adequately and make sure the entire service is improved (I can indeed show that my local fire station that serves 30k people has 1 fulltime fireman on each shift, one firetruck from the 1980s, a rescue truck from the 1980s, and a museum piece firetruck that they keep in the station for some reason). For firefighting, yea, we also need a couple of Bombardier CL-415s, but drones for patrolling is overkill (very expensive and labor intensive, plus an air traffic control headache).

Aerostats which are used by the IDF to monitor the Gaza and Lebanese border could also be used for the purpose of forest surveillance. They hover at relatively high altitude and stay mostly immobile thus not endangering the air traffic. Excellent to keep an eye on the forests. Furthermore, it should be cheaper than employing UAVs.

now that would be good news for all !

Thank you for your informative answer. I really appreciate it. Regarding the concept of accountability, I often wonder how much American ideals of government have made it into the Middle East culture. With so many American-born and American-educated Israelis, I always hoped that they would bring the best of their American experience with them.

Thank you for the suggestion. My idea was one of aerial surveillance in general. I'm not familiar with the technicalities. Something along those lines should be pursued.