Israel’s restaurants are taking note of a landmark settlement holding a Jerusalem eatery accountable for not enforcing no-smoking laws.
A non-kosher restaurant opposite Jerusalem’s Interior Ministry building is paying 2.5 million shekels for failing to enforce no-smoking laws.
Anti-smoking activists hope the ruling will deter other restaurants from failing to enforce the law and increase accountability on the matter nationwide.
The monetary settlement reached by the Focacceta restaurant will be paid to 4,000 customers in the form of 600 shekels in meal vouchers to those who state before a lawyer that they were exposed to smoke in May or June of this year.
Activists have long complained that since the passage of the 2001 anti-smoking law many restaurants and malls have failed to enforce new regulations aimed at protecting non-smokers from second-hand exposure.
The law reads, in part: “Responsibility for the smoking violation [falls upon] …everyone who was at the time of [the violation] an active manager, a partner or a senior worker responsible for that area, will be held responsible — if it was not demonstrated that the violation was made without their knowledge, and that they took all reasonable action to enforce the law.”
New Law Offers Stiffer Punishment
A new law, which comes into effect next month, obligates all owners of public recreation places to instruct smokers to put out their cigarettes. Owners are also mandated to file a complaint against violators with the municipality.
Moreover, owners will be fined 1,000 shekels for every ashtray present on a table in their establishment. There is one accommodation, however: restaurants may set up separate ventilated areas for smokers.