Hadassah Hospital management and employees signed a deal early Wednesday morning to break the stalemate over unpaid January salaries and get doctors and nurses back to work after two weeks of protests in Jerusalem.

Hadasah workers protest at Ein Kerem Hospital lobby (Photo: Hadasah Union)

On Tuesday evening, hundreds of Hadassah hospital employees in Jerusalem hunkered down to spend the night in the Ein Kerem Hospital lobby in protest over their delayed January salaries. Workers, whose open-ended strike was in its fourteenth day, said they would not leave the premises until the issue was resolved.

Nurses and non-medical staff at the Hadassah hospitals walked off the job for three hours in protest Sunday, as the financial crisis surrounding the institution worsened amid claims that the government had botched its end of the affair. Employees of the two Hadassah medical centers had warned that they would intensify their strike after talks to defuse the financial crisis in which the institutions are embroiled ended without an agreement Thursday. The employees announced Friday that the hospitals would continue operating on an emergency basis, performing only life-saving operations and distributing medicine, pending the resumption of negotiations between the trade unions, the Hadassah workers’ union and hospital directors.

Administrative and medical staff at the Ein Kerem and Mount Scopus hospitals went on strike last week after the were only given partial pay for January. On Wednesday, they intensified their strike, announcing that emergency care would function with a scaled-down crew and most of the hospital’s daily operations would be shut down, or carried out on limited “Shabbat schedules,” in protest. The hospitals, administered by the American Hadassah NGO, are some NIS 1.3 billion in debt. The neo-liberal government has offered a misery: NIS 50 million in bailout funds, to be matched by Hadassah, but the sides have yet to come to an agreement.