Robert Peston Robert Peston

What can Britain learn from Israel on ending lockdown?

(Getty images)

Israel has been the world’s whole-country experiment to establish how, and how fast, Covid vaccination can return life to normal (as much as life is ever normal in a country where there is constant tension over the rights and future of Palestinians).

I am in Jerusalem, trying to understand the implications for stability in Israel and peace in the Middle East of a new government where prime minister Naftali Bennett is opposed to any kind of Palestinian state, and the alternate PM Yair Lapid passionately believes a two-state solution is the only answer.

I’ll return to that in later reports, though the short answer – according to members of the government – is that nothing formal or constitutional can and will change during the uncertain life of this coalition to bring peace with the Palestinians of Gaza and the West Bank. 

That said, the government will continue a process started by former prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu of normalising relations with the external Arab world (Lapid is set to do something next week never before done by an Israeli minister, which is that he is making a formal visit to the UAE).

Life is again as bustling, frenetic and crazy as it used to be in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv

But back to Covid-19. The striking thing here is that there are no masks, no social distancing, no restrictions on going to restaurants, or to football matches or to places of worship. The last of the restrictions – having to show a ‘green’ pass proving vaccination to go to social settings like bars, mandatory mask wearing – have all gone since the beginning of June. Life is again as bustling, frenetic and crazy as it used to be in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv.

I spoke to Yuli Edelstein, who was health minister until a few days ago, about all this. Much

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