Reservists lose municipal-tax discounts after wartime protection expires, petition says

A petition submitted to the High Court of Justice by Jerusalem's Hitorerut movement argues that low-income reservists are losing municipal property-tax discounts because their reserve service pay pushes them above income limits. The temporary protection that excluded reserve payments from income calculations expired at the end of 2025, leaving some students facing full arnona bills after previously receiving 80% discounts. The petition cites specific cases, including a medical student who served 425 reserve days and now faces a full annual bill of NIS 5,705.45.

Jerusalem's Hitorerut movement has petitioned the High Court of Justice over low-income IDF reservists losing municipal property-tax (arnona) discounts because their reserve service pay pushes them above income limits. A temporary regulation that allowed municipalities to exclude reserve payments from income calculations expired at the end of 2025, leaving some reservists facing full tax bills after previously receiving 80% discounts. The petition cites a Hebrew University medical student who served 425 reserve days from the war's outbreak through August 6, 2026. His reserve payments brought his recorded annual income to approximately NIS 73,977, above the NIS 5,857 monthly ceiling for a single-person household to qualify for an income-based discount in 2026. After returning to his limited part-time work alongside medical studies, he now faces a full year's municipal tax without the relief he previously received. Another case describes a married reservist whose discount fell from 80% in 2025 to 20% in 2026. A third medical student, whose ordinary monthly wages were approximately NIS 2,600-3,000, received a full annual bill of roughly NIS 5,878 after previously receiving an 80% discount. The movement argues the result is unequal treatment: students who did not serve retain their discounts, while reservists lose relief because their previous year's military compensation is counted against them. Hitorerut seeks to restore the exclusion for 2026-2027, retroactive to January 1, 2026, and asks for eligibility to be recalculated and overpayments refunded.