[UPDATE] Israeli Knesset passes an environmental right-to-know law

UPDATE: Text of law below.

MK Dr. Lea Ness and the environmental caucus in the Knesset (Israeli parliament) successfully maneuvered for the last minute passage of an environmental information law. The right-to-know law amends Israel’s freedom of information act, see Ynet and Walla articles (Hebrew). The new (July 28) law is intended to make public the type of toxic pollution information already freely available through right-to-know laws in the U.S. and Europe. This is terrific! But…

A word of caution. The right-to-know law’s specifics will be left up to Israel’s environmental ministry. The ministry has six months to propose regulations. Israel’s environmental minister, Shalom Simhon, knows how to play political hardball. Will Simhon issue strong regulations to give Israelis an effective right-to-know about toxic materials? Or will the freedom of information rules be saddled by loopholes etc?

Kudos to the Jewish (and Arab and Druze) activists who pioneered the new toxics law, the Citizens For the Environment (CFE) in the Galilee, directed by Liora Aharon. Email CFE your congratulations, send them a donation, and urge them to keep the pressure on the environmental ministry to promulgate a strong right-to-know law.

Kol tuv,

Kaspit

PS Besides writing 3 linked articles above, Zafrir Rinat, the environmental reporter for Ha’aretz, also gives us an update on a lawsuit to clean up the toxic Yarkon River.

Photo sources: Lea Ness and Liora Aharon.

UPDATE: The language of Israel's new environmental information law is indeed broad and vague:

Thanks to the Sagit Porat of the Israeli Life & Environment coalition, below is the Hebrew text of the gist of the new law. (Full text here.) It requires the public authority (the environment ministry) to publish on its website (and in other ways as the Minister's will set up). It stipulates that "environmental information [includes] information on released, spilled, emitted and discharged substances and the results of smoke, odor and radiation measurements, not in the private domain."  Porat says that  "includes" was discussed in committee, omitted from the text, and will (hopefully) be reinserted.

רשות ציבורית תעמיד לעיון הציבור מידע על איכות הסביבה שיש ברשותה, באתר האינטרנט של הרשות הציבורית, אם קיים אתר כאמור, ובדרכים נוספות שיקבע השר לאיכות הסביבה; לענין זה, "מידע על איכות הסביבה" – מידע על חומרים שנפלטו, שנשפכו, שסולקו או שהושלכו לסביבה ותוצאות של מדידות רעש, ריח וקרינה, שלא ברשות היחיד