The Israeli government has approved a special support payment to Holocaust survivors living in Israel. According to the decision, announced on Monday, the state will allocate $155 million over the next three years to 120,000 survivors over the age of 70 who already receive some government support.
Approval of the additional allocations, the Prime Minister's Office said, was based on the conclusions and recommendations of an inter-ministerial committee convened by Social Welfare Minister Yitzchak Herzog and chaired by Social Welfare and Social Services Ministry Director-General Nahum Itskovitz.
According to the decision, the state will allocate NIS 120 million in 2008, NIS 240 million in 2009, and over NIS 300 million beginning in 2011 in financial grants to the approximately 120,000 Holocaust survivors over age 70 who receive National Insurance Institute pensions and income support payments. The government intends to reach a NIS 520-per-month (US$125) supplement for Holocaust survivor couples.
In 2008, the government will make an additional NIS 10 million available for survivors' medical care. There will also be supplemental assistance worth hundreds of millions of shekels from non-governmental sources for the treatment and care of Holocaust survivors, the Prime Minister's Office explained.
The government decision came on the backdrop of an announcement by the Fund for the Welfare of Holocaust Survivors that it would target the Prime Minister in a campaign aimed at forcing him to make good on promises made three months ago to provide assistance. Fund officials explained that they assist approximately 30,000 survivors every year, but are forced to turn down tens of thousands of requests for aid every year due to lack of resources. Most of the requests are health-related, they said, such as requests for assistance with the purchase of medicine, glasses and dentures.
Approving the decision, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said, "We are correcting a 60-year-old blight. Holocaust survivors living in Israel are entitled to live respectably without reaching a situation in which it is beyond their means to enjoy a hot meal. The neglect of successive governments will not continue."
But Knesset Member Colette Avital (Labor), who heads the Knesset Lobby for Holocaust Survivors, reacted with anger on Monday to the proposed allocations. Avital accused Prime Minister Olmert of "mocking the destitute" and "throwing sand in the eyes" of survivors.
"How does the Prime Minister intend to solve the problems of 120,000 survivors," MK 
The government intends to reach a NIS 520-per-month supplement for Holocaust survivor couples.
Avital asked, "when the sum allocated for 2008 is only 130 million shekels? Will 1,000 shekels per person per year solve the distress, the hunger, the need for medicines and nursing aid?" Avital also criticized the structure of the plan, increasing the amount of aid each year while the number of Holocaust survivors decreases every day.
One Holocaust survivor interviewed on Voice of Israel government radio Tuesday morning sharply condemned Prime Minister Olmert's statements that the government's new aid program removes the shame of neglect. The survivor, Noah Blum, claimed that Germany's assistance to Holocaust survivors exceeds that of Israel. Rent subsidies for Holocaust survivors in Germany, for example, are twice as high as that in Israel. Blum also claimed that the Israeli government has not consulted with Holocaust survivors about compensation, but that the German government meets with them every year.