State Comptroller Micha Lindenstrauss released a report Tuesday night saying that government authorities were not fully prepared for last summer’s Gaza Strip evacuation, causing unnecessary damage and suffering to the evacuees. The report found „serious failures” in the way the Disengagement Administration (known by its Hebrew acronym, SELA), Finance Ministry and Prime Minister’s Office handled the disengagement. In an interview with Israel Radio, Bassi said that the release of the report, three weeks before the elections, is clearly politically motivated. „The facts presented in the comptroller’s report regarding the Disengagement Administration are completely out of context,” Bassi said in the interview. Bassi said State Comptroller Micha Lindenstrauss criticized the administration without checking its official policies on matters under question. He also said that employees of the Comptroller’s Office had personally apologized to him for the nature of the report.
Lindenstrauss also criticized the government’s mistaken assessment of how much temporary housing would be necessary. Until a short time before the evacuation, the government had booked only 1,800 rooms in which the evacuees could stay, and was forced to book an additional 1,000 rooms as the evacuation was under way. The evacuees ended up dispersed in 31 hotels, yeshivas and seminaries across the country, which made it difficult for the Disengagement Administration workers to reach them. In addition, the Prime Minister’s Office had assumed that the evacuees would not stay in the temporary housing for longer than 14 days. However, 40 percent of the evacuated families were still living in hotels three months after the pullout. The report found that a cumbersome government bureaucracy prevented efficient preparation for the pullout; that government authorities did not treat the evacuees appropriately during the evacuation; and that government ministries ignored the needs of the local authorities that took in the evacuees. „We are aware that the organizations established for evacuating the residents and absorbing them had to operate under unusual conditions, but the submitted report shows serious failures in the preparedness of the bodies which negatively affected the treatment of the evacuees and caused unnecessary suffering in the process, which in any case was particularly painful,” State Comptroller Micha Lindenstrauss wrote. The government was also mistaken in expecting more evacuees to live in rented apartments. The evacuees used only 63 of the 840 apartments the Disengagement Administration had rented for them at a total cost of NIS 5 million. On the day of the evacuation itself, the comptroller found that government authorities did not treat the evacuees appropriately. They were placed on buses, escorted by police officers, given no immediate access to social welfare officials, and traveled for hours without stopping. The report also criticized the evacuees and the Gaza Coast regional council for failing to cooperate with the government on the pullout, which the comptroller said made it difficult for the government to prepare for the evacuees’ absorption elsewhere. Criticism was also leveled at the treatment of the evacuees’ property: In some cases, their property was damaged, and in others, the evacuees have yet to be given permission to get their belongings from the military base where they are being stored. Citing an example of the bureaucracy, the report said the treasury and Knesset Finance Committee held up the Disengagement Administration budget for 10 weeks.
