Last update - 00:00 27/05/2007
Sderot wants to cancel current school year due to Qassam fire
By Mijal Grinberg and Yigal Hai, Haaretz Correspondents
The Sderot Municipality has asked the Education Ministry for approval to terminate the current school year immediately, and resume classes in August should the security situation allow it.
Sderot children will return to school Sunday for the first time since the recent fighting broke out, although classes will be held outside the embattled town in areas that are not within the Qassam rocket's range.
The students will be brought to Kibbutz Ruhama in armored buses, from which they will be bussed to schools in nearby towns.
The Sderot municipality believes the current busing system is too complicated, and prefers the school year postponed until it can resume without hindrance.
MAI delegation to inspect Sderot factories
A Manufacturers Association of Israel (MAI) delegation on Sunday will visit factories in the western Negev area and inspect damage caused by Qassam rocket attacks.
Since the start of the current wave of hostilities, some 40 percent of workers have failed to show up for work, the MAI estimate.
The representative body of industry in Israel demanded shelters be built at factories in the area in order to ensure the workers' safety. In addition, it called for extra safeguarding of factories that handle dangerous substances.
Meanwhile, representatives of billionaire Arcadi Gaydamak are expecting hundreds of people from Sderot to join the 500 people currently being hosted in Gaydamak's tent city in Park Hayarkon in Tel Aviv.
"These are residents who have stayed in hotels, paid for by Gaydamak and the Defense Ministry. Now that their stay is over, they intend to come here," Gaydamak's representatives said.
David Nitzani, producer of the tent city project, added: "Folks heard we had set up quasi-Club Med conditions for them here." The guests will receive five meals a day plus facilities and child-care services.