An investigation into Israel Railways describes a company in turmoil, where a freight train loaded with tons of iron collapsed onto the tracks because it was secured with only two tension straps and a small support bar. The mishap stranded tens of thousands of passengers and soldiers, disrupted service across the country, and caused damage that, according to one manager, even reached a nearby road. The report says the incident was not a freak accident but the result of severe negligence.
The article also says accountability has gone missing at the top. Transportation Minister Miri Regev and board chairman Moshe Shimoni are portrayed as protecting the system rather than disciplining it, while no senior official has paid a personal price for repeated failures. At the center of the story is Gila Adraee, now a senior manager at the railway and previously the powerful head of the workers' committee. She was promoted three years ago to deputy division head with better pay and benefits, after management sought labor peace.
According to camera footage cited in the report, Adraee was filmed twice in the past month taking a railway utility vehicle for personal errands during work hours, including shopping at a nearby Osher Ad store. Workers say she did not log out and spent about four of 12.5 working hours on personal shopping. In one instance she was accompanied by her personal assistant, and in another by a security department employee. Staff who complained to management and to Regev's office say they were met with a dismissive response telling them to go to the police if anything seemed criminal.
The report says the railway also spent 11,500 shekels on measurements and then another 281,000 shekels on renovating Adraee's office, which employees dubbed "Gila's villa." They say the 300,000-shekel renovation created a 70-square-meter private suite with luxury finishes, a coded entrance, special furniture, curtains, plants and a planned private parking space and synthetic lawn. The article further says about 20 senior managers were flown to Poland last month for an official Holocaust study trip, during which labor chairman Liav Eliyahu, who is under suspicion in a separate corruption case, was treated as an honored guest. Separately, a newly purchased German forklift worth about half a million shekels has been sitting outside a Haifa spare-parts warehouse for 3.5 weeks because it is too tall to fit through the door.
