Israel Admits Holocaust Survivors In Dire Circumstances

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By Naomi Zeveloff April 20, 2017

Israel’s state comptroller sharply critiqued the state’s treatment of Holocaust survivors ahead of Holocaust Remembrance Day on Sunday, Haaretz reported.

In a report issued on Wednesday, state comptroller Yosef Shapira said that Israel had made it difficult for survivors to access the benefits that they are entitled to and some survivors were at risk of going hungry.

According to Shapira’s count, there are 158,000 Holocaust survivors in Israel with the average age of 85. One thousand of them die per month, making a change in their circumstances particularly urgent.

Israeli parliamentarian Itzik Shmuli said that a third of survivors live below the poverty line.

The report also said that survivors had trouble accessing adequate health care, nursing and public housing.

Contact Naomi Zeveloff at [email protected] or on Twitter @naomizeveloff

Naomi Zeveloff is the former Middle East correspondent of the Forward, primarily covering Israel and the Palestinian Territories.

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