Editorial: Being held hostage

We are seeing underworld figures who have chosen our country to settle their accounts, hooligans who turned a women’s polo match into a hell-hole that endangered the lives of even young children, others who attack police precincts with dozens of Molotov cocktails, and a state which is clearly unable to react and which appears to be held hostage to violence, giving the impression that is collapsing.

This situation bears witness to the fact that all that is happening does no concern only police logs. Violence has become part of our society. Wherever it takes root there is no sense of security, but rather of fear. Where violence takes root there is no liberty, and without liberty there is no democracy.

The inertia of the government is patently obvious. The citizen’s protection ministers appear incapable of reacting. There is a lack of a plan, of knowledge, of decisiveness, and of an outlook that violence can be combated in many ways but not with mere rhetoric.

Our country cannot be transformed into a battleground for hooligans or fans of disaster. The country cannot be held hostage just because the government is being held hostage to violence.