Bye Bye Avraham. hello England

The leadership continues to self destruct, the latest "victim" being finance minister Avraham Hirschson suspected of embezzling the equivalent of about a million euro when he was a Likud activist http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/840096.html .Come to think of it Hirschson has always been a shadowy figure, seeming to appear out of nowhere to be quickly entrusted with managing the nation's finances.

In authentic Israeli fashion, Hirschson, after a 7 hour grilling by the police shrugged off questions about his political future , noting that , "I am now running the treasury, and will go on doing so." His political buddy Ehud Olmert said much the same the other day when he noted that, despite his acute unpopularity, the PM's Office is "my place of work". The second they find themselves in deep shit, our politicians ditch all the high-minded verbiage and their public positions are suddenly transformed into simple places of employment apparently unlinked to norms of lawful behaviour.

But enough of that because the whole country's gearing up for the England vs Israel match on Saturday night . The English are coming in their thousands and Tel Aviv is abuzz. We did our best to block this flood of English beer-swilling football hooligans by persuading the Histadrut to organise a general strike that closed down air traffic but the damned government went and solved the problem and now the floodgates have been opened. On Shabbat the beachfront (especially near Mikes Place) will be packed with them, although if they look like the hooligan below....