As state-provided hotels fill up, war evacuees incentivized to stay with relatives

Evacuated residents of Israel’s south and north who forgo government-provided accommodation will be eligible for a daily government stipend of NIS 200 ($50), according to a new compensation plan being prepared by the Finance Ministry.

The plan, which the Treasury is advancing in connection with the evacuation of some 200,000 people from the Gaza periphery and the Lebanon border, is meant to help evacuees find alternatives to state-funded hotels and guesthouses, which are nearing capacity, Globes reported Sunday.

People recognized as evacuees by the Defense Ministry’s National Emergency Authority are divided into three categories: residents living within five kilometers (three miles) of the border with Lebanon; those who live within four kilometers of the border with Gaza, and those who live four-to-seven kilometers of the Gaza border. Sderot, which has neighborhoods in both the second and third categories, falls under the third.

People in the first two categories, which apply to some 79,000 people, are eligible for government-provided accommodation. However, if they choose not to stay at such a facility, under the new plan they could later collect the money for each day they did not make use of the provision. The plan is meant to incentivize people with families or homes outside the danger areas to move there, thus freeing up accommodations for civilians with fewer options.

Many evacuees are currently staying with relatives in the country’s center, or with families who have volunteered to open up their homes to host them.

Whereas the first two categories are eligible for unlimited accommodation, residents who fall in the third are currently eligible for accommodation only until November 2.

If any of the evacuees self-evacuate to a hotel, they will be compensated to the tune of up to NIS 320 ($80) per person per night, Yoram Lardo, the head of the National Emergency Authority, told Calcalist.

The evacuation has cost the treasury approximately NIS 400 million ($100 million) so far, according to Calcalist.

The evacuations began on October 7, when Hamas terrorists carried out a deadly cross-border raid, killing some 1,400 people, most of whom were civilians, in brutal massacres, and abducting at least 224 more, all under rocket fire, which has continued ever since. Hezbollah then began firing rockets and anti-tank missiles into Israel from Lebanon, triggering clashes around the northern border area.

The evacuated municipalities are not the only ones that were targeted in a significant way by terrorists in the current round of hostilities. Terrorists gunned down dozens of people on October 7 in Ofakim and have launched hundreds of rockets into that city, as well as into Netivot and Ashkelon. The state, however, has so far not offered to help with the relocation of significant numbers of civilians from those cities.

Netivot and Ofakim are situated 12 and 22 kilometers from the Gaza Strip respectively, falling outside the evacuation area. Ashkelon is nearer, but its residential buildings are just outside the 7-kilometer mark.

Multiple hotels, municipalities and private citizens have invited residents of Ofakim and Netivot to stay with them for free or at reduced costs. However, some have now been asked to leave such facilities to make room for recognized evacuees from municipalities nearer to the border.

Itzik Krispel, the head of financial development in the municipality of Ofakim, told The Marker on Sunday that the city does not intend to lobby the government for additional funds to accommodate Ofakim residents, except, perhaps, those requiring psychological treatment following the trauma of the October 7 onslaught.

Many Ofakim residents say they will not evacuate out of principle. “We moved here seven years ago,” Daniel Saban, 33, told The Times of Israel on Monday. “We stayed indoors for four days after that attack. Now is the time to resume life. Not to run away.”