PM Benjamin Netanyahu went to Umm Al Fahm to get a photograph with the 1000000th (one million!) patient to receive the first dose of the COVID-19 vaccination in Israel.
That would be big news until it was discovered who this is.
Initially I thought this just happened to be the millionth person, base don appointments and walk ins and all that, he just happened to be the lucky guy. It turns out, according to news reports, this was manufactured as part of Netanyahu's efforts to gain Arab supporters for the coming elections. This fellow was selected for that moment.
OOPS.
That itself is fine. I don't expect any less. Netanyahu is the master of manipulating situations to his benefit. But now it turns out this vaccinee, Mohammed Jbarin, is also a murderer who sat a 20 year sentence for double murder. City officials said they were surprised by the selection of Jbarin as the person to receive the millionth dose and get a picture with the prime minister.
So the Prime Minister arranged a phot shop with a man convicted of double murder. Seems like a fiasco to me.
He can turn this around and say we vaccinate everybody. Arabs, murderers, everyone. The bad optics is still bad optics. I am not sure he will be using this image in his election campaign.... He's definitely fortunate that none of his opponents are ruthless enough to use this strongly against him, as he would if any of them took a picture like this...
------------------------------------------------------
Reach thousands of readers with your ad by advertising on Life in Israel ------------------------------------------------------
