Suspects connected to Hila Betzaleli’s death held until Monday
2nd Lt. Betzaleli to be honored at Independence Day ceremony, which will go ahead as planned despite tragedy
The four suspects arrested in connection with the death of 2nd Lt. Hila Betzaleli were remanded on Friday until Monday. Betzaleli was killed and several other soldiers were injured when the lighting rig collapsed onto the stage at Jerusalem’s Mount Herzl while rehearsals were being held on Wednesday afternoon for next week’s Independence Day main ceremony.
After announcing the decision, Justice Yosef Shapira stated that the police required more time to investigate the incident with the suspects still in custody. Alex Sela, the event’s producer, was remanded as well. Though Sela was arrested on Thursday, he was not immediately named.
Earlier this week, police appealed a court decision to release three of the suspects — Oren Varshebski, an engineer and co-owner of State Design, the company that designed and built the stage and lighting system on Mount Herzl; Elad Levi, another co-owner; and Itzik Tzuker, a safety consultant — from custody. Shapira accepted the police appeal, but ruled that the three would be remanded only until Monday and not for an entire week, as the appeal had requested.
Meanwhile on Friday, the Ministry of Public Diplomacy decided not to cancel or change the location of the Independence Day ceremony set to be held next week at Mount Herzl, despite the Wednesday accident in which Betzaleli was killed.
Public Diplomacy Minister Yuri Edelstein consulted with Knesset Speaker Reuven Rivlin, Minister of Tourism Stas Misezhnikov, and Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat, before making the decision to go ahead with the event as planned.
Betzaleli is to be honored at the ceremony.
In the aftermath of Betzaleli’s death, four people were arrested and charged with negligence, fraud and forgery with respect to a contract to design and build the grand stage to be used in next week’s ceremony. The lighting rig over the stage collapsed during rehearsals Wednesday, killing Betzaleli and injuring several other soldiers.
Police discovered that one of the suspects, Itzik Tzuker, is related to an official in the Industry, Trade and Labor Ministry, and they suspect he was granted several major government contracts inappropriately; as of Friday afternoon, it was unclear whether he possessed a safety inspector license.
Betzaleli, 20, was laid to rest on Wednesday night roughly 200 meters from where she died. Hundreds attended the funeral.
Stage Design’s attorney reportedly stated that the structure had been checked by a third-party engineer with no connection to the company. Furthermore, the lawyer was reported to have said that the company bore no responsibility for the collapse of the stage.
In a separate report, Channel 1 said Wednesday evening that a number of years ago Stage Design purchased the company that built the Maccabiah bridge that collapsed in 1997 as athletes were crossing it, resulting in four deaths and dozens of casualties.
Initial reports, including eyewitness testimonies, suggested that a strong gust of wind caused the Mount Herzl rigging to teeter and collapse. Mere hours later, however, event organizers were casting doubts on that theory and saying that human error was likely the actual cause.
There were also reports that concerns regarding the stability of the structure had been voiced a number of days prior to its collapse.