Hadassah Hospital Interim Board Chairman Avi Balashnikov Resigns
Image by Getty Images
The interim board chairman of Hadassah hospital in Jerusalem resigned.
Avi Balashnikov stepped down over the weekend, according to the Israeli daily Haaretz, because Health Minister Yael German had failed to find a permanent replacement by an agreed-upon deadline. Moti Debi, a member of the board of directors, also resigned.
The resignations are the latest development in an ongoing budget crisis at the Hadassah Medical Organization that began early this year.
The hospital declared bankruptcy in February and, after weathering an employees’ strike, finalized a bailout deal with the Israeli government and the Hadassah Women’s Zionist Organization of America, which built and partially funds the hospital.
Since the crisis began, the hospital has been forced to search for a new director general, as well as a new chair of the board of directors. The hospital is still struggling financially and saw eight of its doctors quit in recent weeks, Haaretz reported.
Israel’s Health Ministry earlier this month ordered the hospital to stop organ transplants for a month due to the continued dispute between doctors and hospital management.
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning journalism this Passover.
In this age of misinformation, our work is needed like never before. We report on the news that matters most to American Jews, driven by truth, not ideology.
At a time when newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall. That means for the first time in our 126-year history, Forward journalism is free to everyone, everywhere. With an ongoing war, rising antisemitism, and a flood of disinformation that may affect the upcoming election, we believe that free and open access to Jewish journalism is imperative.
Readers like you make it all possible. Right now, we’re in the middle of our Passover Pledge Drive and we still need 300 people to step up and make a gift to sustain our trustworthy, independent journalism.
Make a gift of any size and become a Forward member today. You’ll support our mission to tell the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
Only 300 more gifts needed by April 30
