Father of missing 9-year-old girl: Government ‘not doing enough’ to find her
Updating Knesset panel on search for Haymanut Kasau, last seen in Safed in February, police commander says no new leads, even after NIS 350,000 reward offered
The father of nine-year-old Haymanut Kasau, who has been missing since February, tearfully told a Knesset committee on Tuesday that he believes the government is “not doing enough” to find his daughter.
“Haymanut disappeared from us four months ago. We made every effort, the police searched and many citizens volunteered to held us find our dear girl. We still don’t know where she is,” Tesfai Kasau told the committee, while thanking the authorities for their efforts.
“Even before I came to Israel I knew that we have a strong army, we have the Mossad and the Shin Bet and the police. I think the government is not doing enough. How can it be that they’re not doing everything in their power to investigate and find out where she is?” Kasau asked, speaking Amharic via a translator.
“It’s very frustrating. We are helpless,” he added. “We’ve only been in Israel for three years. We don’t know what to do.”
“Imagine that this was your daughter,” the father implored the committee.
Chief Superintendent Yitzhak Abuhatzeira, commander of the Safed police, also addressed the Knesset’s Immigration, Absorption, and Diaspora Affairs Committee, updating them that search efforts were ongoing on a daily basis in collaboration with family and friends of the missing girl.
But Haymanut’s father told the committee, “We called the police, to speak to them. No one answered, including the investigator. We also called Abuhatzeira.”
He said that although police had searched the absorption center in Safed where his daughter was last seen, including the storerooms and bomb shelters, no efforts were made to check the surrounding buildings.
Yisrael Beytenu MK Oded Forer, who chairs the committee, asked Abuhatzeira about a reward of NIS 350,000 (approximately $93,000) offered by Haymanut’s family and the Jewish Agency last week for information that could lead to the girl’s whereabouts, to which the police commander responded that there were no new clues.
Photos of Haymanut were shared with Interpol last week, Abuhatzeira added, though he said authorities do not believe she was taken out of the country.
Haymanut was last seen in security footage at 7:45 p.m. on February 25, handing out municipal election leaflets outside the Jewish Agency absorption center, where she has lived for the past three years since immigrating with her family from Ethiopia.
According to a description, Haymanut stands at 1.20 meters (3’11”) and is slim with dark hair and dark eyes. She was wearing pink pants, a black skirt, and a white shirt at the time of her disappearance.
The Committee for Ethiopian Jews has also offered NIS 10,000 ($2,750) for relevant information that may lead to her whereabouts.
