JERUSALEM - The celebrations in the Prime Minister’s Office over the Supreme Court’s decision to approve the Evacuation-Compensation Law may be premature.
Changes in compensation made by the court in the law will, according to a calculations made by Ynet, cost the country hundreds of millions – if not billions – of shekels.
The court ruled that settlers may apply for compensation from both the Disengagement Authority and the local courts, and that the maximum age for a child grant is 21 years old.
Adding it up
“The country will lose its assets because of what will happen,” Yossi Fuchs, who represents some of the Gush Katif families, said following the ruling.
“There are 4,500 children under the age of 21, multiplied by NIS 4,800 (over USD 1,000) per year, and this amount must be multiplied by the number of years they live. I think it will come out to hundreds of millions of shekels,” Fuchs said.
And that’s only the immediate cost.
Fuchs argues that each settler family can ask the Disengagement Authority for NIS 1.4 million (about USD 300,000) in compensation and then go to local courts and ask for compensation for abandoned fields and factories.
"If I was a farmer, I would sue the government in the Be'er Sheva District Court, for example, for NIS 400 million (USD 90 million) on the grounds that I lost my career as a farmer," Fuchs said.
The Disengagement Authority expects to see an increase in the numbers of settlers asking for compensation following the court decision. As for the cost to the country, the Finance Ministry said, "We will examine the economic ramifications of the Supreme Court's decision."
