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The battle for Ethan comes to court: the arguments of the families and the possible scenarios

The Tel Aviv Magistrate's Court will hear a claim for the return of the six-year-old whose family perished in the cable car disaster to Italy.

To the credit of the Italian side is the Hague Convention, to which Israel is committed, but the exceptional circumstances and the claim that his parents planned to return may lead to him remaining in the country until a decision on custody is made.

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• funicular

Sonia Gorodisky and Yael Friedson

Thursday, 23 September 2021, 00:38 Updated: 06:57

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In the video: Eitan's aunt talks about the custody struggle (Photo: Niv Aharonson)

The Tel Aviv Magistrate's Court will hear this morning (Thursday) the lawsuit for the return to Italy of six-year-old Eitan Biran, the only survivor of the terrible cable car disaster in Italy about four months ago, in which he lost both his parents and younger brother Tom.

After the accident, Eitan moved in with the Biran-Nirko family, his paternal aunt, in accordance with the decision of the Italian court. Since then, there has been a media battle between the two families, the Biran family from Italy on the part of the deceased father and the Israeli Peleg family on the part of the deceased mother, with each of them asking them to live with them. The struggle reached its peak last weekend, when Eitan was transferred to Israel by his grandfather, Shmuel Peleg.

The grandfather was questioned last week on suspicion of kidnapping a minor, after flying his grandson to Israel in a private plane. At the end of the investigation, Peleg was released under restrictive conditions to his home. When asked if he understands that his actions were illegal, Peleg replied: "I received a legal opinion, I passed with an orderly stamping of passports."

The judges will have to decide who will raise Ethan;

Will it be in Israel or Italy, and whether by his aunt on the part of the father Aya Biran-Nirko, or by Gali Peleg, his aunt on the part of the mother who lives in Petah Tikva.

More on the same subject

Eitan Biran's aunt landed in Israel: "Wants to return him to Italy peacefully"

To the full article

More on Walla!

• Eitan's tragedy dilemma: "We are at war, when the only consideration is the best interests of the child"

• After filing the complaint about his abduction: Eitan Biran's uncle met with him in Israel

• Heart attack: how to prevent and what to do in case he still appears

Eitan Biran and his grandfather, Shmuel Peleg (Photo: official website, -)

Now, the legal proceedings regarding Eitan Biran are divided into three: the criminal proceedings against Grandpa Shmuel Peleg for Biran's abduction to Israel, the question of Biran's return to Italy, and the question of custody - which family will raise Biran and in which country.

According to the Hague Convention, to which Israel is a signatory, a child taken by one of his parents to a foreign country without the consent of the other parent will be returned to the country in which he resides as soon as possible. This is in order to reduce kidnapping cases in order to gain a legal advantage, and so that the court that hears his case is the court where he resides.

Biran has lived in Italy since childhood, and his aunt Aya Biran-Nirco is his legal guardian. However, the Peleg family will claim in court that his parents intended to return to Israel, and therefore the place where he lived should be seen in Israel.

The International Department of the State Attorney's Office is responsible for the implementation of the Hague Convention, but the state is not a party to the proceedings, which will take place tomorrow behind closed doors in the Family Court.

At the same time, the investigation against Grandpa Shmuel Peleg continues, and Italy may request his extradition for prosecution.

Attorneys Shmuel Moran and Avi Chimi, representing Aya Biran-Nirko, who filed the lawsuit, told Walla!

Because they intend to argue in the discussion that the child must be returned to his aunt Aya immediately and immediately, and then discuss all the issues that arise and arise.

"It is the duty of the State of Israel to return Eitan to his aunt in Italy as soon as possible," they said.

On the other hand, attorneys Boaz Ben-Tzur and Ronen Daliahu, who represent the Peleg family, will argue this morning that the Hague Convention does not apply and that it is not a kidnapping.

Eitan Biran (Photo: Courtesy of the family)

This is a precedent-setting case in the world, since the Hague Convention and case law in Israel and around the world deal with abductions between parents, but there are almost no precedents and precedents for the tragic circumstances as in the case of Eitan Biran.

The principle underlying the Hague Convention is to return the child to his natural place of residence, from which he was unlawfully removed. This is something that greatly simplifies the arguments of the father's family, the Italian, since from the age of a month and a half Eitan Biran lives in Italy with his two parents, who moved to Italy to study the father's medicine.

The Peleg family will try to prove that Israel is the child's natural place of residence, and will claim that Eitan's parents planned to return to Israel as early as next year, and shortly before the disaster made concrete preparations to return to Israel, including finding an apartment and a school for Eitan. In addition, it will be argued that even during the residence in Italy Eitan stayed in Israel every year for several months, and that if Israel is defined as a normal place of residence the convention does not apply, and the act is not defined as abduction.

The second line of argument of the Peleg family in the hearing would be that the legal proceedings for the appointment of the Autorospace in Italy were fundamentally flawed, because of Aya's allegedly improper conduct.

In an interview with News 12, Eitan's grandfather, Shmuel Peleg, said that he was convinced that the guardianship established in Italy was temporary, and that he had coordinated this with Aya.

"The judge told me, 'This is temporary, this is temporary.'

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