A couple from Karmiel concealed the body of the woman’s 93-year-old mother in order to not lose compensation that she was due as a Holocaust survivor.
After several weeks, authorities found her remains three meters deep in the yard of her home.
In September, Israel Police received a report of concern for the life of a 93-year-old female Holocaust survivor living with her daughter and the daughter’s partner. The report followed conflicting reports that family members said they received from the couple regarding her health and medical state.
Israel Police officers arrived at the home, where they met the couple, who said that the mother had passed away, but they gave suspicious accounts as to her place of burial.
The couple was arrested, and an investigation ensued.
Israeli couple frauds government on Holocaust survivor's allowance
Throughout the interrogation process, the couple had said that the mother had passed away from natural causes in April, that her body had been moved to a different city, and that they were not interested in divulging the location to the authorities. This only strengthened the suspicions against the couple.
Soon after, the man took his own life in his prison cell. Authorities soon put together that he was the one who hid the mother’s body.
Following more testimonies surrounding the case, and after gathering that the body had not actually been buried far away at all, police found that in the garden of the mother’s home, there existed an unusually deep hole in the ground.
Two weeks after the investigation had been opened, the hole was dug up, and on September 30, the mother’s remains were finally located underground. A year and a half after she had passed away, she was laid to rest in honor, including with a reading of the traditional Jewish kaddish prayer.
The suspicion is that her death and burial were not carried out in the proper and legal manner so that compensations that are afforded to Holocaust survivors could continue to stream to the family – the daughter and her partner.
Holocaust survivors are eligible for various financial compensations from and through the Israeli government. These include the National Insurance Institute, the governmental Nazi-persecution disability service, and the Israeli office of the Claims Conference.
Police noted that criminal procedures continue against the daughter, who is suspected of the charges of obtaining by deception, obstruction of justice, failure to report, and failure to comply with a statutory duty.