Insurance Won’t Accept ‘Israel Opened Dams’ As Valid Cause For Flooded House

“We should sue.”

Sderot, January 21 – A resident of this town in the Gaza Envelop district voiced anger today upon discovering that his homeowner’s policy will not cover damage caused to the residence following significant rainfall without proof of how it occurred, despite widespread media reports in the wider region of the government unleashing torrents of accumulated water to deluge the adjacent Gaza Strip, reports that emerge almost every winter.

Avi Benayoun, 40, expressed his sense of betrayal after receiving a letter from his insurance company informing him that if he cannot demonstrate that the flooding damage to his home resulted from force majeur or happenstance and not from his negligence or sabotage, he qualifies for no indemnity. The company responded with the provisional rejection of his claim even though the father of five included in his claim links to numerous reports on Al Jazeera, Al Aqsa TV, Middle East Monitor, Al Arabiya, Al Manar, and other media outlets in the Middle East that flooding in the area occurred because Israel opened dams to make Palestinians in the Gaza Strip miserable.

“This is ridiculous!” Mr. Benayoun shouted, brandishing the contents of an envelope at his wife Odelia. “They rejected our claim!”

Mrs. Benayoun agreed the insurance company had unjustly refused to pay. “It was all over the internet, just like it is every year,” she insisted. “Do these people live under a rock? Israel opens dams, the area floods, homes get destroyed, the whole drill. It would be discriminatory to claim that happens only in Gaza. Maybe we should sue.”

While once an annual ritual, the practice of blaming Israel for drainage-poor Gaza’s flooding woes during the rainy season has in fact tapered off to some degree, industry analysts note. “Last year companies didn’t process any home insurance claims from Gaza based on Israeli-dams-flooding-Palestinian-streets-and-homes media reports,” observed Ned Ryerson of Punxsutawney-Connors Partners. “That coincided with an absence of such reports in regional journalism. Our data indicate a close correlation between the two, but insurers remain reluctant to pay such claims for reasons many residents do not understand.”

Mr. Benayoun vowed to contact his attorney at once, though he first deemed it more urgent to post of his frustrations on social media. The Benayoun family WhatsApp group soon filled with disbelieving relatives posting further links to Israel-opened-the-dams stories from around the region, to help the stymied claimant gather more evidence to bolster his anticipated case. A cousin, the black sheep of the family, posted a simple query as to the locations and names of said dams, but received only a rebuff from his mother for his insensitive attitude.

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