bodies. In this way, a huge parasitical apparatus has been created at the expense of ordinary taxpayers.
In addition, taxpayers have to carry the burden of a large sector of people called haredim (God-fearing) who do not work or pay taxes (nor do they serve in the army, thereby increasing the compulsory service and reserve duties of all the others). Many settlers are also flourishing at the expense of the general public.
The gap between rich and poor in Israel is bigger than in any Western country, a fact that turns Israel into a Third World country.
Mendacity: Mr Sharon is a certified liar. Even at the beginning of his career, the then Prime Minister, Mr Ben-Gurion, defined him as a habitual liar. On January 29, 1960, Mr Ben-Gurion wrote about him in his diary: "If he would wean himself from the habit of not speaking the truth ... he would be an exemplary military leader." Two years earlier, when Mr Sharon was promoted to the rank of Colonel, Mr Ben-Gurion asked him: "Have you stopped saying the untruth?"
The mendacity is not a personal trait of Mr Sharon only, but a method deeply imbedded in the Israeli leadership. A predecessor of Mr Sharon, former Prime Minister Shamir, has publicly declared that lying for the state is a virtue.
One could cite innumerable instances of this official trait. Mr Sharon's immediate predecessor, Mr Barak, for example, spread a mendacious account of the Camp David summit conference (Summer 2000), in order to put the blame for the failure on Mr Arafat. Since then, all the Israeli media repeat this legend daily, in spite of the fact that most leading commentators know the truth.47
The same goes for the Oslo agreements. The Israeli leadership, with the help of the media, hides the fact that most of the violations have come from the Israeli side (they did not implement the third troop deployment, did not open the four agreed "safe passages" between Gaza and the West Bank, have embezzled the tax and customs money collected for the Palestinian Authority, and refused to negotiate in good faith about Jerusalem, settlements, and refugees, as stipulated in the agreements, among other violations).
It will be remembered that even Mr Rabin announced that "there are no sacred dates," thereby relieving himself of the duty to fulfill any obligation at the agreed time.
It should be mentioned that at the time when the Israeli government has pretended to stop settlement activity, this activity is in fact continuing at a frantic pace, as discovered by our satellites.
This, Mr President, is a summary of the report. The task force