Prime Minister Yair Lapid recounted his own family's tragic experiences in describing the government's efforts to improve road safety during the weekly Cabinet meeting Sunday.
"Transportation and Road Safety Minister Merav Michaeli will, this morning, submit to the Cabinet a proposal to boost our fight against traffic accidents. This fight is in our soul. I remember the moment I came home and my parents were standing there at the entrance waiting for me, crying, and they told me that my sister, 24, had been killed in an accident," he said.
"Every accident that you hear about in the media tears a family apart. What makes this even more terrible is that many of these accidents were preventable had the right work been done.
"The State of Israel has not done enough to fight traffic accidents. In recent years, other countries have succeeded in lowering by double-digits the occurrence of fatal accidents because they acted properly. This government is now making change happen and going to work in this area as well," he said.
Turning to foreign affairs, Lapid said: "Tomorrow night, I will fly to New York to represent Israel at the UN General Assembly. I will hold a series of diplomatic meetings there with – among others – President of Türkiye Recep Tayyip Erdoĝan and the new Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Liz Truss."
Lapid described efforts to continue the successful Negev Forum, where Israel and five Arab states agreed to advance regional cooperation. "Today, we will submit to the Cabinet a decision formalizing and funding the working groups for the Negev Forum, which we established last year together with the US, the UAE, Bahrain, Morocco and Egypt."
"These working groups will create economic and security links which, just a few years ago, we could not have even dreamed of. We are working together with entrepreneurs in food-tech, water, energy, tourism and climate, increasing trade between our countries, and are holding a dialogue that strengthens Israel's security.
He added: "Social Equality Minister Merav Cohen will brief the Cabinet on the historic agreement that she signed last week in Berlin between the Israeli and German governments. Under this agreement, an annual NIS 200 million budgetary supplement will be paid out to Holocaust survivors living in Israel. Thousands of Holocaust survivors who are classified as needing nursing care will receive a monthly NIS 1,200 supplement."
"The agreement will join other actions that we have taken this year, through which we have raised over NIS 2.6 billion from foreign countries and the state budget for survivors.
Lastly, since we will not meet again before Rosh Hashanah, I would like to wish every minister: May we all have a good year. May we continue to work hard for the citizens of Israel and foster a respectful dialogue amongst ourselves. I ask that you also convey my wishes for a good year to your families."