The Municipality filed its petition to Bagatz against the flights

On Wednesday this week, July 21st, the Modiin Municipality filed its petition to Bagatz against the flights. The petition was filed against the Israeli government, in particular the offices of Interior, Environmental Protection, Transportation and the Aviation Authorities. Bagatz instructed the government offices to submit an initial response within 14 days, and will schedule a hearing after the court recess.

The Modiin Municipality petition focuses on a demand to the ministry of interior to conduct the due process to change the national outline plan (תמ”א) which does not include the new LDA landing path over Modiin, so that Modiin Municipality is afforded the chance to present its arguments and to demand compensation for the introduction of a new flight path over the city which damages the quality of life of its residents. It should be emphasized that this process will not stop the flights over the city.

This petition has been expanded by a demand to Bagatz to issue an intermediate injunction to prevent the night flights on the grounds of statements issued to Bagatz by the Aviation Authorities over a year ago. The petition also demands that Bagatz issue a ruling that after the runway works in Ben Gurion Airport are concluded (expected in 3.5 years) that the LDA landing path over Modiin will be declared null and void.

As explained in an earlier post, the problem is that Modiin Municipality erased its petition in June 2009, and thus it is essentially relying on a dead process, that was succeeded by a new process with totally different parameters, that resulted with the CAA decision issued in April 2010.

The Modiin Municipality embraced the CAA decision document, overlooking the fact that there was no mention of the hours which this landing path will be used. The petition also does not address the claims by the CAA that the night flights are required for long range flights with heavy cargo who need the longer runway 30.

The Modiin Municipality petition is so desperate that it even references quotes from Joshua book chapter six about how the city of Jericho was brought down with the shofar, in order to claim that it is analogous to the noise from which Modiin residents are suffering.

Council Member Danny Rosenfeld issued a sharp letter to Mayor Bibas in which he pointed out the discrepancies the petition submitted and between Mayor Bibas declarations to city council last week about the petition being against the new landing path and not just against the night flights, and protested the fact that the mayor did not even send a copy of the petition to city council members.. Council member Rosenfeld demanded that mayor Bibas modify the petition so that it is compatible with his statements to city council.

We hope that the petition is successful , although at this time it seems that it will require nothing short of the miracle that brought down the walls of Jericho…

For more details please see our post on our Hebrew website.