Gov't to pay for 17,000 residents of north to leave for several days

Haaretz | August 8, 2006
By Eli Ashkenazi, Jack Khoury and Ran Reznick

The government is offering some 17,000 residents of border towns to leave for several days, Cabinet Secretary Yisrael Maimon said Tuesday.

In making the announcement, Maimon avoided the word "evacuation," saying instead that the residents were offered to leave the war zone for several days of recuperation. The government will pay for the stay of those leaving the border area.

The Kiryat Shmona municipality decided Monday that hundreds of the town's residents will evacuate this week for other parts of the country.

On Tuesday, the municipality will compile lists of people set to leave, most of them senior citizens, handicapped and women who have not left their bomb shelters since fighting broke out last month. They are expected to leave the town on Wednesday.

The director general of the Prime Minister's Office will determine where the Kiryat Shmona residents will go

Last modified August 8, 2006