Report: Home front vulnerable to chemical attack

By JERUSALEM POST STAFF
The home front is woefully underprotected from the dangers of a chemical weapons attack, according to a damning report to be released on Monday by a subcommittee of the Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee headed by Likud MK Yuval Steinitz. The report's authors are urging that NIS 1 billion be spent this year to ensure that residents of Haifa and the North are provided with gas masks and other equipment in case of a chemical attack, The Jerusalem Post has learned. The system by which gas masks have been collected from Israeli citizens to be renewed and stored in warehouses for distribution in the event of an emergency is flawed, according to the report. Assurances that such a distribution could be completed in a few days, if necessary, are empty, the report said. In fact, distribution would take many weeks, it said.