Asbestos is good for children's health

My friend E. lives in a small shack located next to several large houses and newly constructed villas in Ajami.

She has three young children.

Her much richer neighbors decided to do some home improvement and replace the asbestos roof of their home with a pretty tiled one.

Usually you rent a container and the demolition crew immediately remove the rubble. Especially when there is asbestos involved, the work is carried out by a specialist company and under stringent conditions.

E.'s neighbors are too stingy to do so and they simply dump their filth next to E's home, including a large amount of broken asbestos roof elements.

Whenever there is a southern wind, the asbestos dust is blown straight into the window of the children's' bedroom. The municipality refuses to act and the neighbors don't care, although they themselves have young children as well.

E. herself doesn't have the money to employ a company to remove the ever growing mountain next to her home. Her children love to play outside in the yard, but that has become dangerous. But then,. inside the house it is dangerous as well.

It appears no one really wants to take responsibility. If it was their kids living next door, would they be as careless?

Update: After an article in Yediot Tel Aviv the municipality arrived and took away the asbestos and other garbage. The municipal spokesman claimed E. had never informed the municipality it was asbestos, otherwise they would have come immediately, or so they claimed. Right. Daily phones and faxes by E. representative in the municipal council, Omar Siksik, were apparently not heard. In any case, the main thing, the asbestos was removed.

Jaffa mud takes hostages

Different streets in Jaffa were opened up in order to carry out major maintenance work. As usual, the archeologists go in first, then all the other relevant companies; electricity, sewage, water etc.

One huge construction and infrastructure company was working on 4 big projects in Jaffa, in four different locations, Stang.

Traffic jams, mud, we all got used to it.

About 5 weeks ago Stang went belly up and a court decree forbids the municipality to employ any other company in order to complete the works.

And Jaffans pay the price.

People with walking difficulties, young children and the elderly have trouble leaving their homes. At different locations the sewage is open and it is just a matter of time until some small child falls in. One of the open sewers is close to the Weitzman - AlZahara primary school complex. And yes, we informed the municipality, several times, by phone and in writing.

After the rainfalls of last week, the open sewage was flooded and could not easily be seen from the muddy streets.

In addition to the great inconvenience and health hazard, this is an accident waiting to happen. Court order or not, the municipality should take more responsibility. Jaffa residents are not hostages