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"Use the budget
to transfer stray dogs and/or cats of one gender (all the males
or all the females) to a foreign nation that will agree to
accept them," Agriculture Minister Uri Ariel suggested in a
letter to a cabinet colleague leaked to the mass circulation
Yedioth Ahronoth daily.
The proposal, which a spokesman for Ariel said had been rejected
after initial consultations within the Agriculture Ministry, was
roundly criticized by animal rights activists and bemused
opposition politicians.
"No way am I going to apply for a foreign passport for
Pitzkeleh," former Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni tweeted above a
photo showing the smiling Zionist Union party politician
reclining on a sofa and feeding her cat.
The newspaper report said Ariel, a religious Jew and a member of
the far-right Jewish Home party, views spaying and neutering as
possible violations of God's directive "to be fruitful and
multiply" and ritual law that prohibits animal cruelty.
But Zahava Galon, head of the opposition left-wing Meretz party,
wrote on Facebook that Ariel's idea ran contrary to "basic
morality" - and she quipped that it was time to find a country
prepared to grant the minister shelter instead.
(Writing by Jeffrey Heller; Additional reporting by Tova Cohen;
Editing by Dominic Evans)
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