MK Aryeh Eldad (National Union) wrote a letter to Justice Minister Chaim Ramon (Kadima) today, complaining about the refusal of the government - or of a lone government employee - to recognize or fund a school that bears the name of Atzmona. Atzmona is one of the 21 Jewish communities of Gush Katif destroyed last year in the Disengagement plan.
The letter states:
"It has been brought to my attention that the Non-Profit Associations Registrar is not allowing the 'Atzmona Talmud Torah' to continue to exist under its current name.
"Accountant Mr. Dan Rabin, the director of the Supervision and Control Department in the Registrar's Office, told Yigal Kirshenzaft, the head of the Atzmona Talmud Torah association, that because the association did not change its name, it cannot receive authorization. Rabin claims that using the name Atzmona - a community that no longer exists - might mislead the public into thinking that the State allocates funding to a community that no longer exists.
"I am not aware that the name Revadim was prevented for use by those who were banished from Kibbutz Revadim [in 1948] by the Jordanian Legion. Similarly, the Old City Museum existed even in the period when the Old City of Jerusalem was not in our hands. Therefore, it is not clear to me why there is such scheming, harassment, and political persecution on the part of the Registrar in refusing to grant the proper authorization to the Atzmona Talmud Torah merely because the expelled residents wish to eternalize the name of their destroyed community.
"I would be much obliged if you instruct your underlings to declare immediately that distorted political considerations of this nature cannot be allowed to guide government employees."
Most of the families thrown out of Atzmona last summer now live in Shomeriya, between Kiryat Gat and southern Judea. Shomeriya was a secular kibbutz that was in the process of falling apart when the Atzmona people arrived. The government paid the last remaining original families some $300,000 each to relocate.
The letter states:
"It has been brought to my attention that the Non-Profit Associations Registrar is not allowing the 'Atzmona Talmud Torah' to continue to exist under its current name.
"Accountant Mr. Dan Rabin, the director of the Supervision and Control Department in the Registrar's Office, told Yigal Kirshenzaft, the head of the Atzmona Talmud Torah association, that because the association did not change its name, it cannot receive authorization. Rabin claims that using the name Atzmona - a community that no longer exists - might mislead the public into thinking that the State allocates funding to a community that no longer exists.
"I am not aware that the name Revadim was prevented for use by those who were banished from Kibbutz Revadim [in 1948] by the Jordanian Legion. Similarly, the Old City Museum existed even in the period when the Old City of Jerusalem was not in our hands. Therefore, it is not clear to me why there is such scheming, harassment, and political persecution on the part of the Registrar in refusing to grant the proper authorization to the Atzmona Talmud Torah merely because the expelled residents wish to eternalize the name of their destroyed community.
"I would be much obliged if you instruct your underlings to declare immediately that distorted political considerations of this nature cannot be allowed to guide government employees."
Most of the families thrown out of Atzmona last summer now live in Shomeriya, between Kiryat Gat and southern Judea. Shomeriya was a secular kibbutz that was in the process of falling apart when the Atzmona people arrived. The government paid the last remaining original families some $300,000 each to relocate.