The High Court of Justice has ruled that the Mei-Tal Engineering Company will pay an Arab couple NIS 40,000 in compensation after refusing to sell the couple an apartment in Jerusalem.
The couple, which currently lives in Kfar Eiblin in northern Israel, wished to buy an apartment for their son, who is disabled. They looked into an apartment in the Pisgat Ze’ev neighborhood of northern Jerusalem, which is marketed by the Mei-Tal Company. In a telephone conversation with a company representative, it was made clear that they are not selling apartments to Arabs.
The couple filed a lawsuit in the magistrate’s court, which ruled the company must pay NIS 20,000 in compensation because it discriminated against the Arab couple.
Mei-Tal filed an appeal with the district court, which rejected the appeal, accepting the lower court’s ruling that Mei-Tal was discriminating.
The company then filed an appeal with the High Court of Justice, and a three-justice panel heard the case. The appeal was rejected once again, compelling Mei-Tal to make the compensatory payment as the nation’s highest court agreed, the company was acting in a discriminatory fashion.
(YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)