Source (Haaretz)
The city of Jerusalem is refusing to take on the NIS 412,000 water bill racked up by the venerated Old City church that sits on the site where Jesus was believed to have been crucified and buried.
The municipality’s finance committee rejected on Monday an arrangement the state had made to resolve the problems posed by the Church of the Holy Sepulchre’s NIS 9 million water bill.
The popular pilgrimage site serves as the headquarters for the Jerusalem patriarchate of the Greek Orthodox Church, which reached an agreement with the state three weeks ago on what would happen with the bill.
Under the deal, which the municipal finance committee had been expected to ratify, the national and city government would cover the basic debt of NIS 412,000 and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre would begin paying its water bills going back to January 1, 2012. The rest of the debt, representing interest, linkages and fines, would be waived by the water company Gihon.
But the municipal finance committee would have none of it.
“Despite the special sensitivity, it’s unacceptable for the patriarch to drink water while the citizens of the country pay the bill,” said David Hadari (Habayit Hayehudi ), who heads the municipal finance committee. “Jerusalem is home to the most important national institutions, like the Western Wall, the Knesset and Yad Vashem, and they wouldn’t dare run up a bill like this – and if they did, they’d be expected to pay it themselves.”
The full city council is authorized to overturn the finance committee’s decision if it so chooses.
The dispute between the state and the church arose a few months ago, when Gihon threatened to attach the bank accounts of the Greek Patriarchate because it owed NIS 9 million on its water bills. In response, Greek Patriarch Theophilus III threatened to close down the church.
The patriarchate argued that the Church of the Holy Sepulchre had never paid for its water and that the demand that it do so was new and arbitrary.
The Prime Minister’s Office, the Foreign Ministry and the Tourism Ministry all got involved to prevent a crisis, and helped form the agreement with the church that the municipal committee had been expected to ratify.
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