ABSTRACT
Chapter 4 investigates three scenarios in which the State is shamed by suicide media-events involving: a) citizens who fall between the cracks of institutional regulations and become indigent; b) aging and terminally ill populations whose quest for institutionally sanctioned dignified death is refused by the State; and c) marginal groups whose death would have been silenced had it not been for activists who raised their case to public awareness. In contrast to other countries, such as Greece, Italy, India, and China, where failed economic and agrarian policies led to the mushrooming of suicide cases, public debates in Israel were not limited to failures in legislative, welfare, or financial State decisions but focused mainly on the State’s overarching lack of accountability in assuring the endurance of the social compact and its morally sanctioned mutual accountability with its citizens, especially those most needy and disenfranchised due to poverty, illness, old age, disability, or illicitness.
