Amit Adler
Amit AdlerYoni Kempinski

Arutz Sheva met on Monday with one of the organizers of the social housing protest in Israel.

Amit Adler, who brands himself as “the philosopher of the revolution,” had some criticism of some of the organizers of the protest as well as of the academics who are helping them.

“We are happy to listen to all the professors and the academics, but we might need to bring fresh and new ideas from outside academia,” Adler said.

“We need to think about the numbers, but we first need to think about the people,” he added, referring to the academics’ comments regarding finding practical solutions. “It would be done by giving people the things they truly need, like the right to obtain housing, the right to freedom, and the right to live in freedom and have a good education for everybody.”

Adler admitted that some of the organizers of the protest wish to topple the Netanyahu government.

He did not elaborate on what the right of freedom could mean in Israel's democratic society, where protestors can spend days in tents, demonstrate in front of government offices, and there are equal rights for all citizens who can live, work, worship and express themselves as they wish.

“We have a few parties within us and some people are leftist and are against the government,” he said. “Personally, as a philosopher of the revolution, I’m not against the government. I’m against the system. I want to change it and build a better society for everyone.”

He called the protests “a revolution of love” and referred to the biblical verse in the book of Vayikra (Leviticus), “Love your neighbor as yourself.”

“We want to bring back the basic values that Israel is supposed to have and is supposed to give to the entire world,” said Adler. 

He scored a Talmudic point. Rabbi Akiva, the second century Tannaic genius who was murdered by the Romans,  is quoted in the Talmud as having said that the verse  quoted is a basic rule of the entire Torah.