Gov't renews tax-exempt status of Bahai Center
http://www.jpost.com/NationalNews/Article.aspx?id=262554
By JEREMY SHARON
03/20/2012 03:19
Tax arrangement was originally agreed upon between the state and the Bahai movement in 1987.
The
Justice Ministry announced on Monday that it has renewed a deal with
the Bahai World Center in Israel exempting it from indirect taxes for
another five-year term.
The announcement comes ahead of the
holiday of Naw-Ruz, the Bahai New Year that takes place on Wednesday.
The tax arrangement was originally agreed upon between the state and the
Bahai movement in 1987.
Representatives of the Bahai faith,
headed by Albert Lincoln, the secretary-general of the center, welcomed
the signing of the agreement, which he said benefits both Israel and the
Bahai community.
The Bahai religion was founded in Iran in 1844
as a universalist monotheistic faith and claims more than five million
followers worldwide.
Persecuted in Iran for beliefs heretical to
Islam, one of the early leaders of the religion by the name of Mizra
Husayn Ali, or the Baha’ullah as he became known, was exiled from Iran
and with his followers eventually reached Acre in 1868, where he settled
for the rest of his life, wrote the holy scriptures of the Bahai faith
and was buried.
The Shrine of the Bab and the Bahai Gardens in
Haifa are the resting place of the remains of the founder of the Bahai
faith, Siyyid Ali Muhammad Shirázi, also known as the Bab, who was
executed in Iran in 1850. His remains were brought to Mount Carmel and
interred in a shrine there in 1909.
The implementation of the
agreement is supervised by an interministerial committee, headed by the
director of the Justice Ministry, Dr. Guy Rotkoff, who approved the
continuation of the arrangement.
The Bahai have been a recognized religious community in Israel since 1971.
The
main activities of the World Bahai Center are the development and
maintenance of the community’s holy sites in Haifa and the Galilee, as
well as increasing tourism and investment in them.
The Bahai
Gardens in Haifa, along with other Bahai sites in the country, attract
hundreds of thousands of visitors every year – including those of the
Bahai faith as well as foreign tourists and the general public – and are
among the most visited sites in the country.
The Justice
Ministry said that the government views the Bahai holy places as among
the most important tourist sites in the whole country.
The
government will transfer funds equivalent to any indirect outlays
incurred by the World Bahai Center or any of its associated non-profit
organizations for activities it carries out in operating and developing
the sites.
Rotkoff underlined the importance of the relationship
with the Bahai center, especially for the activities that it has done to
help develop the Galilee region.