JERUSALEM (JTA) — The family of 4-year-old Adele Biton, who remains in a coma one year after a Palestinian rock attack, has been told the girl must leave her Raanana rehabilitation center.
A lawyer’s letter on behalf of the Loewenstein Hospital Rehabilitation Center delivered on Tuesday gave the family 24 hours to leave with their daughter.
Pleas from the girl’s mother, Adva Biton, to Israel’s health and economy ministers, Yael German and Naftali Bennett, requesting more time from the center were not successful.
Adva Biton said the family, who lives in the West Bank Jewish settlement of Yakir, has not spoken personally with hospital personnel and thus was unprepared for Adele’s release.
“We are not here because she is sick, but rather because Adele was injured in a terror attack because she’s Jewish,” Biton said, according to the Times of Israel. “The State of Israel owes us the time and assistance she requires.”
The hospital told the Times of Israel that it had given the family a month’s notice and that the girl’s treatment had concluded with no signs of improvement.
Adele has remained unconscious since the March 14, 2013 attack, when a car driven by Adva Biton carrying her three young daughters near the West Bank settlement of Ariel swerved after being hit by rocks thrown by two Palestinian teens and struck a truck.
“Ariel Sharon lay in Tel Hashomer [hospital] for eight years, in a coma and on a respirator, with no improvement in his condition, and I paid for it,” Adva Biton said. “[Here is] a 4-year-old girl who is showing signs of life — give her a five-month grace period.”
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