Last update - 00:00 01/10/2007
Green activists released after arrested at Lake Kinneret protest
By Eli Ashkenazi, Haaretz Correspondent
Tiberias Police on Monday released five members of the "Green Action" environmental group who were detained hours earlier for allegedly removing a portion of a fence that surrounded a private beach on Lake Kinneret.
The organization opened a publicity campaign at beaches across the lake under the banner "Lake Kinneret belongs to all of us; we have the right to enter it for free."
Group members called the police response to their protest "strange."
"They are not even prepared to release the arrestees on bail," said activists. "The police are dealing with us rather than dealing with the real criminals who are stealing Lake Kinneret from the hands of the public."
Green Action activists on Sunday staged their protest at a number of beaches which they say have been illegally closed off to the public.
"We are protesting the possibility that entrepreneurs will change the beach line at other beaches on the Kinneret and take more property from the public in favor of real estate and private profits," said Yaniv Steinmetz, the group coordinator at Kinneret College.
According to Steinmetz, the Tiberias municipality is operating under the guise of helping residents to block off one of the few free open beaches at Lake Kinneret.
"The government established in its Economic Arrangements Law an authority whose function is to regulate the whole matter of Lake Kinneret and ensure that the beaches remain open to the public, to preserve the quality and quantity of the water and to be concerned about the rights of the citizen with all things related to Lake Kinneret," said Steinmetz.
"Neverthless, on the one hand the government has established an authority like this, but on the other it is permitting the construction of a hotel on the northern beach. We call on the government to expedite the creation of a Lake Kinneret authority to ensure that the treatment of its beaches will best benefit citizens," he added.
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