Charges of “protektsia” (pull) were aired in the Knesset today in connection with an alleged housing scandal reported by the newspaper Haaretz. Knesset member Shmuel Tamir of the Free Center faction demanded an investigation into the Haaretz report that Shikun Ovdim, the Histadrut building company, sold six immigrant flats in Haifa at easy terms to sons and daughters of top Labor Party officials in Haifa.
Tamir asked Housing Minister Zeev Sharef why the Government had to import mobile homes to house immigrants when flats earmarked for immigrants were being sold cheaply to favored persons. Sharef replied that his ministry was not responsible for the acts of Shikun Ovdim which was not required to sell its flats to anyone in particular.
Avraham Offer, the Labor MK who heads Shikun Ovdim, denied the Haaretz allegations in an earlier statement. He said the six flats in Haifa were sold on the public market at normal prices. Offer was not present at today’s housing debate in the Knesset. Also absent was Labor MK Moshe Wertman of Haifa, whose unmarried son was allegedly one of the beneficiaries of Shikun Ovdim’s “protektsia.”
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