The Knesset Finance Committee today approved disbursing budgets to pave two major bypass roads in Samaria, the Huwwra Bypass and Luban Bypass.
The long-awaited approval came two years after a hunger strike by bereaved families and council heads over the issue of bypass roads, and the agreement with the Prime Minister to allocate NIS 200 million to the bypass roads.
Following the hunger strike, Samaria Regional Council head Yossi Dagan has led contacts with government ministries over the past two years. The final step is approval by the Finance Committee to transfer the budget approved by the government. Today, the Finance Committee approved transferring the budget of NIS 324 million from the Finance Ministry to the Defense and Transport Ministries for implementing the project.
Dagan appeared for a discussion with experts in the Samaria Regional Council and bereaved family representatives who were hunger striking two years ago. Hadassah Mizrahi lost her husband Deputy Commissioner Baruch Mizrahi in a shooting attack, Itzik Abutbul who widowed his wife Hadas Abutbul in a shooting attack on the roads of Samaria, and the girl Ayala Shapira who was wounded in the face by a Samaria firebomb about four years ago and came to the discussion with her mother Ruth. Passing the budget was assisted by MK Mickey Zohar, Minister Betzalel Smotrich, and other MKs.
"These roads belong to a budget that was already approved by the government two years ago," Dagan said. "It's embarrassing that bereaved families and heads of government needed to hunger strike for such a thing, but once the budget is already approved there's no reason other than politics and hatred to delay it. These are roads that are used by both the Jewish population and the Arab population and will improve transport both at the security level and at the safety level. The discrimination where Judea and Samaria is second class in infrastructure and security, as compared to every other region of the State of Israel, must end. Passing the budget today is a significant step in furthering the cause. We'll work with all our might and will try to reach a situation where the infrastructure in Judea and Samaria will be like anywhere else in the State of Israel, and we'll achieve infrastructure to enables millions of Jews in Samaria."
The meeting was attended by committee Chairman MK Moshe Gafni (UTJ), MK Michal Shir Segman (Likud), as well as a representative of Yisrael Beyteinu who supported the budget transfer by vote.
Hadas Mizrahi said at the hearing, "As the leader of a protest tent of the bereaved families who lost my husband in an attack, I hear that the money has not yet passed due to a transitional government. It infuriates me. A transitional government can take a long time. Travel on certain roads in Judea and Samaria is a death trap. These are things you can't stop. Immediately start paving the bypass roads that we'll no longer see difficult cases like mine for a ridiculous reason like infrastructure."
Ruth Shapira's mother, Ayala Shapira, added "Existing roads are British Mandatory roads that don't fit the security or transportation needs of the 21st century. When our vehicle was burning on the road, there was no access to the ambulance, and the wounded were evacuated by SUV and a dirt road. Bypass roads are not a luxury but an essential need."