The Supreme Court on Tuesday ordered the Tel Aviv
Municipality to take action against businesses operating on Shabbat. In their
verdict in a lawsuit filed by small businesses, the judges said the symbolic
fines issued to those breaking the law weren’t enough and demanded the
municipality “enforce the law.”
Tel Aviv, often known as “The City that Never Sleeps,” is
famous for being Israel’s most cosmopolitan city and residents boast that it is
the only city
where you can go shopping 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
Since it is against the law in Israel to operate retail
businesses starting sunset on Friday and throughout the Jewish Sabbath,
businesses that remain open are frequently forced to pay a small fine of
several hundred shekels.
Supreme Court President Justice Asher Grunis, his deputy
Miriam Naor and justice Elyakim Rubinstein, on Tuesday, overturned a ruling by
the Tel Aviv magistrate’s court following an appeal by small businesses and the
local merchants union, who argued that the fines issued to offenders put
smaller businesses at a disadvantage.
While large co-ops like Tiv-Ta’am and AM:PM could afford to
pay the fines, they become exorbitant for private mini-marts, the plaintiffs
claimed.
The magistrate’s court had ruled it was up to the city to
determine its policies.
Naor wrote that the municipal law was clear, as it required
businesses that wished to open on Saturday to apply for a special permit. In
reality, she wrote, “the municipality makes do with ridiculous fines of a few
hundred shekels per week, and the chains reached the conclusion they’re better
off paying it and continuing to operate on Shabbat.”
Naor wrote that the municipality could decide whether it
wishes to allow businesses to open on the day of rest, but then it “must change
the municipal law.” It was unacceptable, she said, to conduct a policy which
meant the city was essentially ignoring its own regulations.
Tel Aviv City Hall issued a statement in response, saying it
would study the ruling but would ensure the city remained “free.” “We will find
a solution that will balance Shabbat rest with the freedom the city has always
offered,” read the statement.
MK Nitzan Horowitz (Meretz), who’s running for Tel Aviv’s
mayoralty, said the court exposed “the problematic policy” of the city, which
“milked the residents and small businesses using fines and taxes.”
“The current situation, in which the municipality doesn’t
enforce its own laws, and also makes a profit from it, can’t continue,”
Horowitz wrote on Facebook. It was time to amend the municipal laws so that
some businesses could operate lawfully on the weekend, he said, noting he
“wanted to safeguard” Saturday as a day of rest, while taking into
consideration those who wished to use the day for shopping, hiking or other
activities.
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