"Roughly 3,000 families, hundreds of building contractors, as well as 24 municipalities should be eligible for compensation"
Jerusalem — With five kids and monthly rent topping $1,200, it didn’t take long for Ronen Mizrachi to calculate how much more he would get for his money if he moved his family out of Jerusalem.
So two years ago, Mizrachi, a lawyer, and his wife, an optometrist, purchased a piece of land in Har Gilo, a small, tranquil Jewish settlement-cum-village about five miles south of Jerusalem.
“Prices of apartments in Jerusalem were out of our reach so we decided on Har Gilo,” Mizrachi said. “After we purchased the land we started the procedure to obtain all the building permits. That took a year. We had all the permits in hand in September 2009 and had just started digging when the freeze took effect on November 26.”
The freeze — the Israeli government’s decision to suspend for 10 months virtually all construction in the West Bank, taken at the behest of the Obama administration — has left the Mizrachis and many others in personal and financial limbo.
“We’ve already sunk something like 500,000 shekels [$132,000] into the land and permits, but we can’t build,” Mizrachi said anxiously. “We took out loans that cost more than 2,000 shekels [$530] a month to repay. And that’s on top of our 4,600-shekel rent. We have five kids and we still have to buy them food and clothes. It’s not easy these days,” he said.
While U.S. Vice President Joe Biden spent much of this week in Israel trying to jumpstart stalled negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian Authority, the Mizrachis and others personally affected by the building freeze wondered when, or even if, they will ever be able to build or fully recoup their losses.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s announcement this week that the government is prepared to compensate homeowners, builders and some municipalities has done little to assuage fears.
“I’ve already written letters to the minister of defense, to his assistant, to Knesset members. I’ve already sent out all of my documentation,” Mizrachi said. “The money is there but no one has decided on criteria and who to pay. In the meantime, we’re paying for a house we can’t build.”
Roughly 3,000 families, hundreds of building contractors, as well as 24 municipalities should be eligible for compensation, according to Knesset member Danny Danon, who spearheaded the compensation campaign. Ultimately, the prime minister agreed to a plan without the need for legislation.
The criteria outlining how the compensation is to be allocated will be drafted “in the coming weeks,” Danon told The Jewish Week. He estimates that homeowners will receive about $26.5 million in total and the amount that will go to building contractors is “unknown.” He does not yet know when the money will be distributed.
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