It is not clear whether Moshe Silman, 57, who set himself on fire on Saturday in the midst of a demonstration over the high cost of living in Tel Aviv, will survive. He sustained burns to 90 percent of his body, and efforts to save him are ongoing. "People in this condition don't usually survive," said the head of the burn unit at Sheba Medical Center, Dr. Yossi Hayak. Silman's family, who rushed to the hospital upon learning of the incident, lamented the tragic event. "He never did anything bad to anyone," said Silman's sister Batzion Elul. Blaming the authorities for her brother's desperate act, she said, "The moment he got into financial trouble they took everything away from him. They took his business, his truck, his home. His situation deteriorated and he couldn't bear it. He appealed to the authorities but they rejected his appeals." "He was always saying that he would do something, because he realized that no one was listening," she added. President Shimon Peres on Sunday said, "Something happened in Israel that shocked many. I want to say that I am praying, along with all of Israel, for Moshe Silman's recovery." Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also said, "This is a great tragedy. I wish Moshe a full recovery." He added that he had instructed the welfare minister and the housing minister to investigate the handling of Silman's case. Silman, who had lost all his property over the last few years, became active in the Haifa chapter of the social justice protest movement. Many of the local activists were familiar with his personal story and his difficulties. Dozens of Haifa activists gathered in the city center on Sunday and held a vigil in Silman's honor, carrying signs with slogans saying, "This is not a personal tragedy, this is evil policy," and "We are all Moshe Silman." "Moshe Silman set himself on fire in protest over his financial situation and the terrible crisis in his housing situation," said Ofer Barkan, one of the prominent Haifa activists. "Over the last year he repeatedly approached countless institutions in efforts to obtain assistance in housing that would help him integrate back into society but to no avail." Few people in the building in which he was staying knew Silman. "Every once in a while I would see him," said one neighbor. "He told me that he had gone bankrupt and was living on the street, and the owner of the apartment had let him stay there to keep squatters out. I never saw him with family or with friends. Every few weeks a woman would visit, and when I asked if it was his daughter he said she was a distant relative." The welfare establishment in Haifa also barely knew Silman. A senior municipal official told Israel Hayom on Sunday that "he wasn't registered as a resident of the city and the only contact we had with him was through the National Insurance Institute." Meanwhile, there is concern that people in financial distress will emulate Silman and similarly hurt themselves. The Yedid foundation, established in 1997 to promote social and economic justice in Israel, reported that it had fielded two calls since Sunday by people in financial distress threatening to set themselves on fire. In addition, a resident of Ariel threatened to set himself on fire at a branch of the Orange mobile phone company in Petach Tikva over a NIS 20,000 debt. The security guard on site averted the suicide attempt. The fall that led to a desperate act Silmans is a tragic story of a man who lost all his money, his property, his home and even his health, and in a moment of indescribable desperation doused himself with gasoline and set himself on fire in front of hundreds of onlookers, yelling, "In the name of social justice." Silman was born in Israel, to a Holocaust survivor father. At age 14 he ran away from home. At age 18, in hopes of rehabilitating his life, Silman joined the military, but was discharged early. He later volunteered for additional military service and even served in the reserves until he was 46. After his discharge, Silman took odd jobs, mainly in central Israel and in Eilat. At one point he moved to the U.S. where he started a delivery business, and earned a steady living for the first time in his life, but several years later, he suffered a painful blow. Silman amassed debt and tried to end his life. Having failed, he tried to rehabilitate himself and took a job as a taxi driver, but this attempt also failed and his life became chaotic. He then tried to manufacture pots for plants from polyester, and even convinced his aunt to invest money in his business. But this endeavor also collapsed. When he sued the plastic manufacturing company, the court rejected his lawsuit, saying, "Here is a man, without any experience or professional education, who invented a product that requires complex engineering and training in various engineering fields. He may call himself 'number one in the world in polyester' but still, there is no one responsible for this product from start to finish." "Silman is convinced that he was terribly wronged, and he said harsh things to the defendants. 'You ruined my life. Today I was finished completely. This was a dream I worked on for half my life,'" the judge continued. "This is not a dream, it is a fantasy, and it is a shame that Silman chose to point all his arrows at individuals who actually tried to help him as much as possible in this project." The organization Rabbis for Human Rights actually knew Silman well. Rabbi Idit Lev, who had closely accompanied him, said Sunday that "ever since I've known Moshe he has always insisted that he would not be homeless, because he refused to relinquish his basic dignity. The state erased him and his distress and he refused to be invisible." "The National Insurance Institute claimed that he owed a lot of money and repossessed his truck," she added. "The repossession brought him to bankruptcy. The bank repossessed his home in Jaffa and he moved in with his mother." To save money, Silman moved to Haifa, but then his health began to fail. He suffered several strokes, and could no longer work. "He got a disability stipend," said Lev. "He suffered from relentless dizzy spells and could not work." Silman was classified as 100 percent disabled in May 2012, but he was only eligible for 50 percent disability benefits. "The National Insurance Institute gave him a NIS 2,300 monthly stipend, and he was supposed to live from that," Lev continued. "His two sisters helped him with food. He didn't take some of his medication, and didn't get medical care. During the entire time he kept asking for help with housing but he failed to meet the criteria. When his mother died, her apartment was repossessed to pay off his debts. The Housing Ministry said that Moshe wasn't eligible for assistance." The organization filed appeals, the last of which was due to be decided this September.
