After two court petitions by the environmental group Home Guardians and the intervention of the Interior Ministry’s regional director, the Carmel Beach Regional Authority in northern Israel announces that it will return a $480,000 donation received from the natural gas company Energean Israel.
Energean Israel, a subsidiary of the Greek Energean, owns the franchise to the Karish and Tanin natural gas fields off the Mediterranean coast and is exploring for additional oil and gas in the area. Karish and Tanin are to set to start commercial production next year.
The coastal authority is responsible for monitoring rogue emissions from offshore natural gas production facilities and was initially unwilling to accept the idea that taking a donation from one of the gas companies could potentially cause it a conflict of interest.
Energean is also fined NIS 878,000 ($270,000) by the Environmental Protection Ministry for violating its permit on waste flushed out to sea by one of its exploratory drilling vessels.
— Sue Surkes
It's not (only) about you.
Supporting The Times of Israel isn’t a transaction for an online service, like subscribing to Netflix. The ToI Community is for people like you who care about a common good: ensuring that balanced, responsible coverage of Israel continues to be available to millions across the world, for free.
Sure, we'll remove all ads from your page and you'll unlock access to some excellent Community-only content. But your support gives you something more profound than that: the pride of joining something that really matters.
Join the Times of Israel Community
Join our Community
Already a member? Sign in to stop seeing this
You're a dedicated reader
We’re really pleased that you’ve read X Times of Israel articles in the past month.
That’s why we started the Times of Israel - to provide discerning readers like you with must-read coverage of Israel and the Jewish world.
So now we have a request. Unlike other news outlets, we haven’t put up a paywall. But as the journalism we do is costly, we invite readers for whom The Times of Israel has become important to help support our work by joining The Times of Israel Community.
For as little as $6 a month you can help support our quality journalism while enjoying The Times of Israel AD-FREE, as well as accessing exclusive content available only to Times of Israel Community members.
Thank you,
David Horovitz, Founding Editor of The Times of Israel
Join Our Community
Join Our Community
Already a member? Sign in to stop seeing this
From the Liveblog of
Sunday, December 20, 2020
