"Tent city" protests in Tel Aviv

There is an ongoing protest in Tel Aviv about the housing prices.

Here are my comments:
1. The protest demonstrates the ignorance of the most protesters, as well as of the politicians involved, about the mechanisms behind the market economy. While the government may restrict the prices, this will likely result in the reduced offer on the housing market, i.e. in the shortage of the available housing.

2. In the case of the politicians supporting the protesters this ignorance is most likely deliberate. Particularly, particularly, this seems to be the case in regard to the members of the Meretz and Hadash party, who hold advanced University degrees. Given that they are among the smallest parties, their bet is a) either to bring down the government in a hope that the next government will be formed by Kadima which will allow Meretz and Hadash to become part of the ruling coalition, or b) playing to the feelings the most extreme/uncompromising of their supporters to ensure the party's re-election (at the moment Hadash and Meretz hold respectively 4 and 3 seats in 120-member Knesset.)

3. It is ironic that protests expand from Tel Aviv to Ben-Gurion University in Beer Sheva, since the housing in Beer Sheva is known to be quite cheap. This may be an indication of the fact that the protests reflect the political aspirations of the student union leaders, rather than those of the students themselves.

4. The support from the Spain's M15 movement is also not something that the protesters should be proud of. Indeed, the protests in Spain were triggered by the government attempts to introduce austerity measures in order to prevent a Greece-like economical crisis. It is also worth remembering that economically unjustified availability of the housing is believed to be the reason for the recent World economic recession.

Added:  
Here is a relevant reference to a basic economics textbook:
Gregory Mankiw, "The Principles of Economics". In particular in Chapter 6: "Supply, Demand and government policies", there is a relevant example on p.125: "Rent control in New York City".