Adalah to Bank of Israel: Stopping the Transfer of National Insurance Disability Payments to over 5,000 Palestinians in Gaza is a Violation of their Right to Property
Since January 2009, the National Insurance Institute (NII) in Israel has discontinued the transfer of disability payments to more than 5,000 eligible Palestinian residents of the Gaza Strip. Seemingly, the reason for stopping the transfer is that the Bank of Israel has halted all business with the Bank of Palestine and with all the banks in the Gaza Strip. In this context, Adalah in cooperation with Al Mezan in Gaza sent a letter to the Directors of the Bank of Israel and the NII and to the Finance Minister demanding that they transfer all outstanding payments immediately.
In her letter, Adalah Attorney Sawsan Zaher emphasized that these workers were injured during the course of their work inside Israel and they paid all national insurance fees and taxes prior to their injuries. Following their injuries, the workers submitted requests to the NII for the receipt of disability payments. Under the National Insurance Act of 1995 the file of each worker was transferred to an internal medical committee, which certified his disability and entitlement to the allowance. NII payments have been made by Israel to these workers for many years.
Adalah argued that in previous decisions, the Israeli Supreme Court has affirmed that National Insurance payments are the property of the beneficiaries and therefore any detriment to them affects the constitutional right to ownership of property and contradicts the Basic Law: Human Dignity and Freedom – 1992.
Attorney Zaher added that the transfer of disability payments to Israeli beneficiaries living in Israel and not to Palestinians, merely because they live in the Gaza Strip, constitutes discrimination on the basis of ethnicity and nationality. It also contradicts the right of Palestinian workers to equality before the law.
One affected worker is Mr. Tayseer Al Basoos, who lost his eyesight due to a work accident in 1978 in the city of Ashkelon (Askalan). Today, he is married and a father of six children; he lives in Gaza. He was 16 years-old at the time of the accident and since then he has received National Insurance payments without any hindrance. His payments stopped in January 2009.
Mr. Naim Faran, who worked in a packaging plant that prepares citrus for export in the city of Ashdod, was in an accident which led to the amputation of his right hand in 1983. Mr. Faran is married and a father of seven children, two of whom are university students. He also lives in Gaza and received his insurance allocations consistently until January 2009.
Due to these injuries, these disabled workers cannot work to support themselves or their families; they fully rely on their allowances, which are their only source of livelihood.
