Are electric bicycles a motor vehicle and what is the responsibility in the event of a motor vehicle accident ? This question was addressed to the Netanya Magistrate's Court in a lawsuit filed against the insurance company in the event of an Israel electric bicycle accident .

The plaintiff claimed that he had a car accident during October 2016 when he was staying with his friends in downtown Netanya in Israel while he was riding an electric bicycle and was talking about an electric bicycle accident. He said the case happened when he was clocking a taxi door with a window open and talking to his friends who were sitting in the taxi. The taxi driver began speeding while clocking the cab door, resulting in him falling off the electric bicycle and being hit in the hip joint, left hand and lower back. As a result of the accident, the plaintiff suffered an orthopedic disability rate of 10%.

The plaintiff filed suit against the insurance company Shomera, the taxi insurer, the taxi driver and the cornea – the fund for compensation for road accident victims claiming an Israel electric bicycle accident. The plaintiff claims that a case of electric bicycle fall is a road accident as defined in the Road Accident Victims Compensation Law, 1975.

There was a factual dispute between the parties as to how the incident occurred. Shomera denies the circumstances of the accident and claims the driver was not involved in the incident at all. There is also a legal dispute regarding the question of defining an electric bicycle as a motor vehicle as defined by law. On the day of evidence, the taxi driver did not appear in court and the court did not have a place to petition for a motion to dismiss the evidence hearing because of default stabilization until guarded.

The court ruled that in relation to the circumstances of the accident, the plaintiff attached the notice to the police and medical documents upon his hospitalization after the accident detailing the circumstances of the accident as he claimed. The plaintiff also testified and his friends and testimonies were coherent, orderly and unobtrusive. The witness testimony was trustworthy on me and was not concealed.

The lawyer for the insurance company Shomera argued that electric bicycles should be regarded as a motor vehicle in accordance with the Pelat law. He claims that since it is an uninsured motor vehicle, there is no cause for action in accordance with the Compensation Law.

The plaintiff claims that this is not a motor vehicle. According to him, he should be seen as a pedestrian who was hit by the taxi driver, and therefore, is obliged to pay compensation. No cornet joined the plaintiff's claim that electric bicycles are not a motor vehicle, and to the extent that they are indeed a motor vehicle, then the plaintiff's judgment as a driver who owns a motor vehicle that did not insure his vehicle, and therefore in these circumstances he has no cause of action against the horn.

The court noted that the question of whether electric vehicles should be considered a motor vehicle was discussed in the case and disagreements were presented in this regard.

In 56471-10-18 Plonit v. Silberstein, [published in Nevo], the Tel Aviv District Court ruled that electric bicycles should not be considered a motor vehicle. , With reference to the legislative situation, policy aspects, and the need for comparative law, electric bikes do not meet the definition of "motor vehicle" in the Compensation Law and therefore do not require compulsory insurance.

In the judgment, the court ruled: Given that the electric bicycles discussed in this case were standard electric bicycles, I would recommend that members of the vehicle dismiss the appeal by stating that standard electric bicycles do not meet the definition of "motor vehicle" in the compensation law and therefore do not require insurance. "

In contrast, the judgment given in Haifa District Court (by Justice Kamal Saab) stated that electric bicycles constitute a "motor vehicle" as defined in section 1 of the Compensation Law  10767-06-14 Assulin v. Druysh [Posted in Nevo] (September 27, 2019) In the same matter, electric bicycles were stopped in one of the multiple states, and accordingly, the court held that, given that electric bicycles were never licensed, they did not issue an insurance certificate to cover their use, and no license was required. Driving their drivers, and considering that section 7 (5) of the Compensation Law states that an injured person will not be entitled to compensation under the motor vehicle without insurance, the claim was dismissed on grounds of the Compensation Law.

The court noted that this issue is pending in the Supreme Court's classification of electric bicycles as part of a number of appealed cases. Judge Liat Har Zion ruled that the guardian's liability for the plaintiff's compensation should be acknowledged. "On the merits of the matter – I believe that a judgment emerges in the matter of Silberstein which established the Halacha according to which standard bicycles will not be considered a motor vehicle, because the burden on this matter applies to watchmen to show that the bicycles are non-standard and therefore to be considered motor vehicles. "From the police file and / or from the evidence to the evidence that the bikes were non-standard. I was not persuaded to prove that bicycles had been made or modified in a way that they were exempt from the Silverstein determination."

The court awarded the electric bicycle rider NIS 386,305 in compensation, with an attorney fee of NIS 58,000 as well as legal expenses incurred by the plaintiff and fee. The court also ordered the dismissal of the lawsuit against Karnit, stating that the plaintiff would incur NIS 10,000 Karnat attorney's fees as well as expenses in which Karnit carried.

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