Despite Bnei Zion disaster, pre-military academies remain unsupervised
Following Zafit Stream disaster which left 10 teens dead, Education and Defense Ministries' joint committee determines former will not supervise academies, angering members of the public.
The issue of pre-military academies not being supervised by any ministry as well as the ministries' attempt to deny their responsibility of the Zafit Stream disaster has come under harsh public criticism.
The incident occurred in April this year when ten Israeli teens were killed—nine girls and one boy—after they were swept away in a flash flood that rushed through the Zafit Stream in HaArava during a trip in south Israel.
The Defense Ministry was quick to pass the buck, stressing that the responsibility of the pre-military academies rests with the Education Ministry.
Since the two ministries allocated in 2016 a total sum of NIS 76 million to the academies' budget, a joint committee was established to review the matter of supervision.
The committee is expected to submit its report recommending that the pre-military academies' principals are given responsibility to decide whether their academy is subjected to the supervision of the Education Ministry.
Moreover, it appears the Knesset will not pass any laws regulating the supervision over the pre-military academies.
Several weeks after the disaster the Education Ministry's Director General Shmuel Abuhav told Ynet, "The pre-military academies are an independent body and the Knesset determined that the Education and Defense Ministries are responsible for supervising them."
One possibility that has been reviewed is obligating the academies to be subjected to the supervision of the Education Ministry's situation room which supervises some 160,000 field trips of educational institutions per year.
The situation room is authorized to cancel trips, to change tracks and to provide professional guidance during weather changes and other cases that put the students at risk.
The pre-military academies are currently temporarily under the purview of the situation room.
However, in light of the recommendations and despite the grave disaster caused by the lack of supervision, the academies will not be obligated to be under the supervision of the situation room.
Chairman of the Pre-Military Academy Association Danny Zamir said, "We will comment on the final report when it is concluded. We were full partners in writing the report."
The police transmitted its recommendations to the State Prosecutor's Office last month to charge the Bnei Zion academy's instructor Aviv Berdichev who planned the fatal trip with manslaughter and to charge the academy's director Yuval Kahan with causing death by negligence.
Mej. (Res.) Shira Etinger was appointed at the beginning of the week as the new director general of the Bnei Zion pre-military academy.
Etinger is a former combat helicopter pilot and will take on her new position on July 15, with her first decision as director general being to reopen the Bnei Zion academy only next year.
