Still waiting for justice

The wheels of justice grind slowly in Israel. People wait for years, sometimes decades, for the courts to settle their cases. In few instances is this painful waiting period more blatant than in the case of the victims of the Versailles disaster and their families. Once a popular banquet hall on the Baka/Talpiot border, Versailles became a wedding nightmare for Keren and Asaf Dror when a major part of the floor of the four-story building collapsed. Among the 23 dead were the groom's 80-year-old grandfather, and among the injured was the bride, who suffered severe injuries to her pelvis. The groom carried her out of the rubble in his arms. That was on May 24, 2001. Once the bride had recovered from surgery, the couple's families packed them off to Miami, where they are living to this day. The knowledge of what happened at their wedding and the numerous tragedies that resulted can never make their wedding anniversary a happy occasion. In early 2002 the Knesset passed the “Versailles Law,” establishing a special committee to treat those injured and recommend sums of assistance for victims and their families. Yet today, barely a third of the people who filed for damages almost immediately following the calamity have been compensated. “We're still waiting for the courts to make a decision,” says Shabi Levy, whose mother and paternal aunt were among those who lost their lives. Levy has nothing against the Drors. “It wasn't their fault,” he tells In Jerusalem. But he strongly suspects there was some sort of conspiracy and cover-up by people in high places – most significantly, the Jerusalem Municipality. Levy has been nursing a bellyful of bitterness for 15 years. He's not yet ready to give vent to all his suspicions – which he claims are more than just suspicions – because he realizes that if he opens his mouth it may jeopardize his case. But he does apportion a great deal of blame to the municipality, which he says was negligent in allowing the banquet hall to function while failing to meet basic safety standards. “I have plenty to say about the people involved,” he asserts, “but first I'm waiting for the court decision.” Nonetheless, he notes, quite a number of the people who were on the verge of going to court changed their minds, and they or their relatives suddenly had good jobs at the municipality. He declines to name names, saying only that he knows who they are. Levy and his four siblings suffered another blow after the initial tragedy: Their father died of a grieving heart. Levy arrived late for the wedding, thereby escaping any injury to himself. “I arrived at the same time as the fire brigade,” he recalls. Panic-stricken, he began to search for his mother, who, it later transpired, was buried beneath the rubble. He worried most about her but was also concerned about other relatives who were at the wedding. Most were not badly hurt. He believes that part of the reason there has been so much foot-dragging over compensation is that the people who sued could not agree among themselves. There had been a move to establish a nonprofit association so that they could file a class-action suit together, but it was the old story of two Jews, three opinions – and because they could not reach a consensus, the plan failed to materialize. KEREN ITZHAKI is angry – very angry. Every year, there was some kind of official memorial ceremony to mark the anniversary of the Versailles tragedy, with dignitaries representing the government and municipality in attendance. This year, there was no ceremony. “It's as if they're trying to erase the whole affair from public consciousness,” says Itzhaki. “Those of us who lost loved ones don't need to be reminded; it's with us all the time. But the general public needs to be reminded so that it doesn't happen again.” Itzhaki shares Levy's belief that the municipality is shirking its responsibility. If it allowed the proprietors of dangerous premises to operate a banquet hall and put people's lives at risk, it is just as guilty as the people who received prison sentences. The tragedy has left a permanent traumatic effect on Itzhaki and members of her family. When they go to a wedding, bar mitzva or any other event in a banquet hall, they never sit in the center, but always at the side hugging the walls so they can escape in the event of another catastrophe. “It could happen so easily,” she maintains. Itzhaki can never forget that night in May 2001. She was not a guest at the wedding, but her sister Vicki Cohen and her sister's fiancé, Motti Botin – who on that very day had sent out invitations to their own wedding, which was due to take place six weeks later – were among the guests. The Cohen family lived only a few minutes from Versailles, sufficiently close to hear the music. It was a warm night and they were relaxing on the balcony of their apartment when they heard a loud boom. They thought it was a terrorist attack. Itzhaki's father promptly ran into the street, with her following behind, to see what they could do to help. They saw ambulances and the fire brigade arriving, but even though the public was asked to remain outside, people with relatives inside paid no heed and went searching for them. Itzhaki's father was one of those people, but he couldn't find his daughter or his future son-in-law. They were buried beneath the rubble. Later, the family checked out the hospitals to which the injured had been taken, but there was no sign of Vicki, 23, or Motti, 24. Fear for the worst began to set in. The next day, one of Itzhaki's cousins went to the L. Greenberg Institute of Forensic Medicine at Abu Kabir and discovered and identified Vicki and Motti. To this day, Itzhaki can still hear the anguished weeping of her parents. She resents the fact that not once throughout the years did the municipality send a social worker or psychologist to find out if the family needed help of any kind. They were simply left to their own devices. Like Levy, Itzhaki has been waiting for 15 years for a ruling from the court, and also like Levy is convinced that the case is being deliberately dragged out “so that we'll become tired and exhausted, and we'll simply give up. “No one cares what happens to us.” YET SOME good came out of the enormous loss. One of the first paramedics to reach what was left of the Versailles building was Eli Beer, the future founder of United Hatzalah. By chance, he and three other paramedics had been in the immediate vicinity, having been called to another banquet hall where the grandmother of a bar mitzva boy had suffered a mild heart attack. While Beer and his companions were trying to persuade her to go to hospital, they received a beeper call that something had happened at Versailles, but there was no explanation accompanying the message. They rushed over, not knowing what to expect. Speaking to In Jerusalem this week from Panama, where six years ago he established a unit of United Hatzalah that now has 100 volunteers, as well as ambulances and ambucycles, Beer remembers arriving in record time at the scene of the catastrophe and seeing someone running and calling for help. The person was covered from head to foot in the white dust that had emanated from the collapsed ceiling. “He was dramatically in trauma. The whole scene looked like something out of Hollywood. There was a hole right through the building, and people at the top were desperately holding on to metal railings,” Beer recounts. Many people were trapped beneath the rubble, and those who could do so were running away, possibly fearful that the whole building might implode. Compared to a terrorist attack, it was silent, says Beer, explaining that people are always shouting after an attack; but here, although there was some noise, it was relatively quiet and eerie. Beer and his three colleagues ran inside. Urging them to do what they could to help the injured, Beer sped outside to the walkie-talkie in his car and frantically began to call Magen David Adom, the fire brigade, the army and Hatzalah volunteers in Jerusalem, Beit Shemesh and surroundings. There were few cellphones in Israel at that time, and beepers and walkie-talkies were the main sources of instant communication. Hatzalah was purely a regional Jerusalem organization with a total of 150 volunteers, but the enormity of the situation made Beer realize that it was essential to expand into a nationwide organization of first-responders. Today, there are 3,000 volunteers in Israel alone, and probably more in total in the various countries in which Beer has established branches. When he began calling on that fateful night, the people to whom he spoke did not believe him at first because his description of what he had seen defied imagination. “We're talking about hundreds of victims,” he kept repeating. There was so much turmoil that the paramedics didn't know whom to treat first, and likewise the fire brigade and soldiers from the Home Front Command didn't know whom to evacuate first. Beer became a spontaneous on-site commander, directing people towards the injured and the dead. “When I was there with only three volunteers, I thought my heart would break because people were dying all around us,” he remembers. Aside from realizing the importance of a nationwide response team, what Beer learned on that awful night was the urgency of giving a concise and accurate report of a disaster so that those who come to help will know what to expect and what to bring with them. This has become an essential part of Hatzalah training. Because United Hatzalah has achieved an admirable international reputation, similar non-Jewish organizations in the countries in which are there are branches of United Hatzalah ask to learn their training methods, and representatives of such groups frequently come to Israel for additional training. “This is a big tikkun olam [repairing the world], because Israel has the best disaster response teams in the world,” says Beer, adding that indirectly, United Hatzalah – which treats the sick and the injured regardless of religion, race or nationality – is quietly quelling the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions Movement. After all, how could anyone boycott or impose sanctions on a life-saving organization?

Still waiting for justice

Beyond the people lost forever and the injuries that will never heal, barely one-third of the victims and their families have been compensated. Yet some good has come out of the calamity.

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