Over the first twenty-four hours of the winter storm system currently striking Israel, many Israelis have suffered property or psychological damage. Trees fall on vehicles and passers-by, equipment flying in the wind hurts citizens, and poor infrastructure results in bodily injuries. We discussed the parties with attorney Omer Harlap, an expert in tort claims.
"Contrary to popular opinion, there is no automatic compensation for weather damage in Israel. There is no law or statutory fund that compensates for such damage," begins Harlap. "All that remains is to take out an insurance policy, whether for a car or for a building and its contents. Most apartments are covered through their mortgage, and for bodily injuries, many policies cover personal accidents."
The second option to deal with such an injury is to file tort claims. "If you are injured by a fallen tree, there may be grounds for a lawsuit against the local authority. In our office, we deal with quite a few cases following damage to eucalyptus trees, which have a tendency to break and fall and cause quite a few accidents, and are very common in parks throughout the country. We encounter quite a few tree collapses specifically from eucalyptus."
Harlap emphasizes that "each case is individual." If the authority knows that there is a certain tree that is prone to causing damage because there have been complaints or warnings that it will fall, then it is certainly possible that there is a cause of tort, but a private person can also be sued. If a solar panel on a roof is not properly secured and it flies off and someone gets hurt, we could be sued. Each case is judged on its merits and things are examined by common sense."
And what about the storm itself? Does the legal reality change if it is a "reasonable" storm or a rare storm that could not be expected? Harlap responds in the affirmative. "In the case of an extreme case, not like the current storm, cases that could not be foreseen, a claim of force majeure could come and there could be a problem because the insurance does not cover it."
The definition of the term 'force majeure' requires statistical proofs and supporting evidence that the insurance companies will bring before the court and sometimes expert opinions in the field will also be presented to prove this. The label is not completely subjective.
"As far as natural disasters are concerned, with the exception of the provisions of the law on agricultural damage, there is no compensation from the state," Harlap commented and said that indeed "it is possible that the legislature will allocate money for a particular case, but at the moment there is no compensation. The classic example is an earthquake - here is no compensation for such cases beyond everyone's personal insurance."