Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met on Monday with 14-year-old Tal Hajaj, the daughter of a former South Lebanon Army soldier, who had been holding a hunger strike in front of the Knesset building to bring attention to her familys dire financial situation. At the meeting, the teenager accepted Netanyahus request to stop her hunger strike, and the pair shared a meal before she returned home. Hajaj, who was just two years old when her family came to Israel from Lebanon, now lives with her parents and five siblings in a two-room apartment in Tiberias. She launched her hunger strike on Thursday in front of the Knesset building in Jerusalem. This week, she sent a letter to the prime minister begging for assistance for her destitute family. Among other things, she wrote, I love Israel and the Zionist movement. Hajaj belongs to the Betar youth group in Tiberias. My family needs help, she wrote. Our financial situation is dire and I go to bed with an empty stomach so that my younger siblings will have something to eat. My family contributed greatly to this country, and made enormous sacrifices, and yet no one helps us in our time of need. After not receiving a reply from the Prime Ministers Office, she decided to begin her hunger strike. At their meeting, Hajaj told Netanyahu: I just want to be like everyone else. Netanyahu embraced her, saying, I have yet to meet a 14-year-old as mature as you are. I beseech you to go back home, to school and to stop your hunger strike. Netanyahu promised to form a committee of ministers to take care of the problems of the families of former SLA soldiers. The SLA fought against the PLO and Hezbollah and was supported by Israel. It was disbanded in 2000, when Israel withdrew from South Lebanon, and many SLA members and their families fled to Israel. Minister Without Portfolio Yossi Peled, who is responsible for the governments handling of the SLA families, was also at the meeting. Peled said that some of the SLA families were taken care of by the Defense Ministry, while the rest were looked after by the Absorption Ministry, which provided less financial assistance. Hajajs family is among the latter group. Netanyahu asked Peled to find ways to help Hajajs family. We had an incredible meeting and I am happy that the prime minister found the time to take care of us, Hajaj said after the meeting.
