The Defense Ministry stated Saturday evening that Glad Shalit will receive disabled veteran status immediately upon his arrival in Israel and will not have to undergo any bureaucratic process first.
The decision was made in response to a request filed by Kadima MK Yisrael Hasson and will be implemented for any future abductees and prisoners of war upon their return to Israeli soil.
Until now, Defense Ministry procedure determined that a prisoner who is returned to Israel needs to prove the existence of post-traumatic disorder or some other condition that he suffers from as a result of his imprisonment in order to be recognized as a disabled veteran.
MK Hasson thanked the Director of the Defense Ministry, Maj. Gen. (res.) Udi Shani, for making the decision. The move "allows us as a state and as citizens to give the minimum required of us to combat soldiers who have come back from captivity, in order to enable them to function normally again… It is not right that a returning captive have to face another ordeal and fight for his basic rights with bureaucratic committees, in order to prove that he is indeed worthy of being defined as disabled."
For the past two years, MK Hasson has headed a team in the Knesset's Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee that examined the Defense Ministry's Rehabilitation Department.