With over 400,000 Israelis unaffiliated with any religion, the country's civil burial system is insufficient, a report by the Knesset Research and Information Center revealed this week.

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The data was submitted ahead of Tuesday's joint meeting by the Constitution and the Jewish Religious Services committees to discuss civil burial in Israel.

According to the law, which was enacted in 1996, every Israeli citizen has the right to receive a civil burial. It also mandates the establishment of civil cemeteries across Israel, with a reasonable distance between them. But according to the report, this is not the case.

Out of the 1,200 cemeteries in Israel, only 27 provide civil burial services de facto. Another four provide such services without a valid burial license or are in the process of renewing it.

Of those who do provide burial services, the vast majority only do so for local residents or those of nearby cities. Only three provide state-funded burials to any Israeli.

The report further shows that not only has the civil burial system not been built in the last 30 years, but the establishment of civil cemeteries across Israel also seems nowhere in sight.

The Religious Affairs Ministry is said to have no data as to how many Israelis were buried in civil ceremonies between 2019-2021, or as to how many are expected to in the coming years.

The Religious Affairs Ministry was not immediately available for comment.

MK Gilad Kariv, who chaired Tuesday's meeting, said, "We are very concerned about the [lack] of implementation of the law, and this is the first step that can be taken in cooperation with all the ministries to advance alternative civil burial.

"As someone who has accompanied communities and people in their most difficult times, I can say that there is a large public that is forced to go through a lengthy ordeal in order to perform the basic mitzvah [commandment] of honoring the dead and to bring their loved ones to a proper burial," he said.

Jewish Religious Services Committee Chair MK Yulia Malinovsky said, "The largest public in Israel is the one that has no choice. The development of [civil burial in Israel] cannot be placed in the hands of private bodies.

"As for the accessibility of information [on civil cemeteries], the website of the Ministry of Religious Services has to have an organized list of plots, including phone numbers, and it has to clarify that the burial is free," she said.

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The mile-long labyrinth, with 23,000 burial chambers lining the walls and ground, was tunneled into the hillside beneath Jerusalem's main Jewish cemetery, Givat Shaul, which is quickly running out of space.

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Hevra Kadisha, the primary group overseeing Jewish burials in Israel, has invested some 300 million shekels ($86 million) in the modern twist on an ancient burial practice that it hopes will ease the pressure on the city's cemeteries.

Video: Reuters

Dozens of graveyards in Israel have already closed their gates to new burials. Non-Jews, who make up a minority in Israel, are buried in separate cemeteries.

The first 8,000 graves will be ready at the end of the month.

"According to our plan, after we finish the first part of 23,000 graves, probably we will have enough space to continue digging underground," Chananya Shachor, director of a local chapter of Hevra Kadisha, said on Sunday as the media got a first glimpse of the work.

"We will continue if people will accept this new method of burying."

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Israel Hayom learned this week that the parochet has been found at a warehouse in the Jewish National Fund building in Tel Aviv.

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The parochet disappeared in 1949, after Herzl's re-burial.

Two weeks ago, the JNF directorate decides that the historic JNF headquarters in Tel Aviv would be turned into a boutique hotel that would include a museum honoring the history of Zionism. This week, as the building's warehouse was being organized, Dr. Arie Ben, a historian who has managed the JNF museum for 30 years, a piece of gray cloth that was lying folded underneath a closet. Only after it was unfolded did it become apparent that this was Herzl's lost parochet.

JNF chairman Danny Atar, who has decided that the item will go on permanent display at the JNF headquarters, told Israel Hayom that "We have the great privilege of finding this important historical item that links us to the father of Zionism, and reminds us of the fact that without Zionism, there would be no JNF, and without the JNF there would be no Zionism."

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