School directors convicted for negligence in Nahal Tzafit disaster deaths

Multiple staff members have been convicted for negligence nearly seven years after the deadly Nahal Tzafit disaster in which 10 students were killed in a flash flood while on a hike with the Bnei Zion pre-military program, Israeli media reported.

Yuval Kahan and Aviv Berdichev, Bnei Zion’s directors, were convicted on 10 offenses of causing death by negligence, as well as two additional counts of injury by negligence.

These charges are in contrast with the original case, which accused the directors of reckless homicide, according to the reports.

Ten teenagers from the preparatory program – nine girls and a boy – were killed after being carried off by a sudden surge into the dry riverbed west of the southern part of the Dead Sea amid intense storms. The students were hiking on a field trip at the time of their death. As part of the hike, the group entered a stream and continued on their route despite the start of rainfall.

Faulty preparation

Kahan and Berdichev were initially questioned over their failure to heed flood warnings and call off the hike, police said.

Kahan’s “behavior on the day of the disaster shows that he was missing and silent,” said the verdict, according to KAN News. He “did not respond as the head of a pre-army preparatory program should have.”

The verdict added that despite multiple warnings in the days before and on the morning of the events, of which the accused were fully aware, they did not cancel the trip, Ynet reported.

Some parents of the students who were killed reacted to the verdict. Some expressed disappointment in the punishment, while others burst into tears as it was announced, Ynet reported.

“Despair,” the mother of one of the victims told KAN News. “There are no words to describe the terrible feeling,” she added.

“The judge did not raise the flag for sanity for Israeli society,” said another mother. “Disappointing and painful.”

One father said the verdict gave the parents a “ringing slap in the face,” according to Ynet.

Gil Hoffman, Reuters, Tamara Zieve, and Avraham Gold contributed to this report.