General Strike Paralyzes Israel
Pastor Dale Morgan
General Strike Paralyzes Israel*
The Associated Press
Wednesday, July 25, 2007; 1:48 PM
JERUSALEM -- Israel's largest trade union Wednesday began a general
strike that shut down the country's seaports, land crossings, railways,
mail service, garbage collection and many other public services.
With the Histadrut union giving Ben-Gurion International Airport an
extra day to operate during the peak tourism season, airlines squeezed
in as many flights as possible.
In the 12 hours before the airport was to be closed Thursday morning,
the airport planned takeoffs every three minutes for a total of 120
flights carrying 20,000 passengers, Channel 10 TV reported.
El Al Israel Airlines was advising passengers to go to show up five
hours before flights were scheduled to depart instead of the usual three.
At daybreak Wednesday, most other public services were shut down.
The union began the open-ended strike after talks with the Finance
Ministry over public sector pay broke down. Talks resumed Wednesday, and
the Israeli Finance Ministry said the strike could be settled later in
the day.
One hundred forty flights were set for Thursday. With schools on summer
break, this is a peak period of overseas travel for Israeli families.
Analysts suggested the Histadrut could be hoping that the government
would make concessions after the first day's strike, avoiding an
unpopular airport shutdown.