Supreme Court 'suggests' invalidating absentee property law used to confiscate land in 'east' Jerusalem
The Supreme Court has 'suggested'
invalidating a 1950 law that allows the government to seize property in 'east' Jerusalem that has been abandoned by its former owners. The good news is that the court does not want to throw out the thousands of Israeli Jews who live on such properties, finally recognizing the reality that you can't expel people on that kind of scale.
The High Court of Justice issued a recommendation on Tuesday to the state, and
to lawyers fighting to undo state confiscations of east Jerusalem land, that the
court declare the use of a 1950 law to justify further confiscations
unconstitutional.
While some of the petitioners, such as top lawyer
Avigdor Feldman, were ready to embrace the recommendation as a long-delayed
righting of what they considered decades of injustice, other petitioners, like
NGO Adalah’s director Hassan Jabareen and lawyer Souhad Bishara, were dismayed,
viewing the suggestion as permanently anchoring in law nearly 50 years of unjust
confiscations.
...
The
court, presided over by Supreme Court President Asher D. Grunis, asked all of
the parties to provide legal opinions on its suggestion to declare the law’s
application in east Jerusalem unconstitutional, and to give their own ideas on
whether the declaration should take effect only now, or retroactively from a
different date.
Only two weeks ago, Attorney-General Yehuda Weinstein had
announced a major policy reversal in which the government would stop using the
1950 Absentee Property Law to confiscate east Jerusalem properties from Arabs
for the benefit of Jews and the state.
The announcement had been designed
to avoid this exact eventuality of throwing out the law’s application entirely,
but may not have succeeded.
That state announcement followed a May High
Court decision demanding it explain its position in using the 1950 law to
confiscate land in east Jerusalem following the 1967 Six Day
War.
...
After the War of Independence, the law was used to
take over homes and lands that Arabs had left empty or abandoned during or
following the fighting.
The current controversy concerns to what extent
the state can do the same in east Jerusalem, with all of the legal, political
and international issues involved.
Reportedly the state has had
inconsistent policies on using the law over the years, sometimes invoking it and
sometimes not.
It's like they never heard of
eminent domain....
Labels: Arab land grabs, Arab land sales to Jews, East Jerusalem, eminent domain, Supreme Court
Netanyahu seeking to legalize Jewish towns built on 'private Palestinian land'
On Sunday, 38 of the 120 Knesset members, including
over half of the Likud's Knesset delegation, signed a letter to Prime Minister Netanyahu urging him not to raze Jewish homes built on 'private Palestinian land' and instead to
pay compensation to those who can prove ownership. Netanyahu can read the writing on the wall. He is
going along with the plan.
At a meeting with ministers from his Likud party, he said he would order Neeman to explore ways to legalize the buildings in question. Any such solution would require new legislation.
...
While the task force's members have not yet been appointed, it seems they will not come from either the state prosecution or the military prosecution.
Culture Minister Limor Livnat, one of those who pushed for the task force, told Arutz Sheva radio on Monday that the goal was to examine the issue "without fear of what leftist groups will say. As the government, we need to govern."
Another politician said that even if the task force produced no solutions, its work would take several months and could provide a pretext for postponing the demolitions.
Haaretz has reported in the past that parts of two veteran settlements, Ofra and Eli, are also built on private Palestinian land. So far, no legal solution has been found for these settlements, so the task force will presumably be asked to deal with this issue as well.
Meanwhile, the government is also working energetically to legalize everything that has been built on state land, but without proper master plans or building permits, in both settlements and outposts. At stake is much of what has been built in the settlements over the last 20 years. Based on the state's submissions to the High Court, it seems it plans to legalize 326 permanent houses and 344 caravans.
However, various government legal officials say that certain outposts cannot be legalized without a cabinet decision to establish a new settlement - something the government wants to avoid due to the diplomatic ramification of such a moves. The government is seeking to declare these outposts neighborhoods of nearby settlements.
"Israel's policy regarding construction in Judea and Samaria has not changed," a statement from the Prime Minister's Office said in response to this report.
Livnat is right. The government needs to stop worrying about what the Leftists (including Haaretz) will say. It needs to govern and LEAD instead.
What could go wrong?
Labels: eminent domain, Judea and Samaria construction, Migron, outposts
Common sense to prevail? Likud MK's propose compensating landowners instead of demolishing homes
Likud MK's, including Netanyahu ally Limor Livnat (pictured), are proposing that the government
compensate landowners in cases where Jewish homes are found to have been built on private 'Palestinian' property rather than demolishing the homes. As you might imagine, this has 'human rights' groups up in arms.
At the Likud ministerial committee on Sunday, the Minister of Culture and Sports Limor Livnat proposed the creation of a committee of independent, professional experts to examine alternative options that would avoid demolitions and allow for the authorization of such homes.
“Our job is not to be bulldozers and to destroy,” she said.
Livnat said she had calculated that possibly as many as 160 homes could be removed, and that this was unacceptable.
The families that live there are law-abiding, she said. “It can’t be that the homes of some 1,000 people will be destroyed and that they will find themselves without a roof over their heads,” Livnat added.
In particular, Livnat focused on the Ulpana neighborhood of Beit El, which she said was created 15-years ago with initial government support and grants. But the two other high risk places are the Migron and Givat Assaf outposts.
Livnat said that it was not clear that land which was designated by the state as private Palestinian property truly deserved that designation and that this needed to be checked by a committee of experts.
In some cases, no one has claimed the land and in other cases, ownership cannot be documented, she said. In cases where Palestinian ownership has been proved, it is possible to grant compensation rather than returning the property, she said.
Since Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu took office in 2009, the state has spoken of authorizing illegal construction on state land, but has firmly stated that it intends to demolish such Jewish building on private Palestinian property.
Still, according to Diaspora Affairs Minister Yuli Edelstein who supported Livnat’s proposition, the prime minister appeared receptive to her words.
According to Livnat’s office government secretary Tzvi Hauser has been tasked with exploring the issue.
But MK Yariv Levin (Likud) is not waiting for the government. He is already working on a bill that would offer an alternative to home demolitions on private Palestinian land by offering, instead, compensation to the Palestinian owners.
“The current situation in Judea and Samaria is intolerable,” Levin said on Sunday. “The judiciary is being used as a tool to promote the extreme left’s political goals, such as harming settlers.”
Levin said “We cannot accept a policy in which we don’t build, illegal Arab construction is not dealt with, and Jewish homes are destroyed.”
“The Prime Minister does not have a mandate from the public or Likud MKs for this behavior,” he added.
I've been arguing for years that these cases ought to be treated as
eminent domain cases. Maybe now it will finally happen.
Labels: eminent domain, home demolitions, Migron, outposts
Israel respects eminent domain takings - but only when they're carried out by Jordan
Okay, this is bizarre. The State of Israel regularly expels Jews from 'private Palestinian land' even after houses sit on that land for years because it's 'private Palestinian land.' A much more logical solution would be for Israel to take the land by eminent domain and compensate the 'owners' (as is done in every other country in the West). Instead, the government of Israel insists on
destroying people's homes.
But when the government of 'Jordan' takes land...
that's different.
Israel is pushing ahead with a plan that would legitimize construction on land near the settlement of Ofra in the West Bank.
The Supreme Court ruled as early as 1979 that settlements may not be built on confiscated private Palestinian land. The move's legal foundation appears to hinge on the fact that it was the Jordanians, not the Israelis, who confiscated the land - before Israel took over the West Bank during the Six-Day War in 1967.
Jordan had confiscated land from the villages of Ein Yabrud and Silwad to build a military camp. When the settlement project began after 1967, the first settlers used the military buildings as sleeping quarters for a camp they established there. By 1975, the camp had become Ofra, the first Jewish settlement in the northern West Bank, now home to more than 700 families.
The land in the current plan contains a cluster of dilapidated buildings. In the past two years, amid a housing shortage, the settlers of Ofra began preparing the land for a new neighborhood. The land now lies within Ofra's fence; in effect, the plan would expand the settlement.
...
Two months ago, the original Palestinian owners petitioned the High Court of Justice to demolish the buildings and give them back the land. Until 1979, construction of settlements on Palestinian land seized for "military needs" was the norm. The Supreme Court ruled this practice illegal in 1979, and the state stopped confiscating private Palestinian land for settlements. But settlements have since been built on private land expropriated before 1979.
Responding to the recent petition, the state said it has no intention to carry out the Civil Administration's demolition orders, and that it plans to prepare the site for construction.
The affidavit, submitted by an adviser to Defense Minister Ehud Barak, Eitan Broshi, noted that the decision to legalize the construction was made after it was found that the land had been expropriated by the Jordanians.
The move is legally complex: While the land was originally confiscated by the Jordanians, Israel has since reaffirmed the Jordanians' confiscation order and stated that the land would be used for public needs such as infrastructure. This also contradicts the use intended for the land in the new plan.
Hmmm.
Labels: eminent domain, Jordanian occupation, land use, Supreme Court
Heroes' homes to be razed?
The good news is that the town of Eli is finally going to get a real zoning plan and is going to become completely legal. The bad news is that the homes of the families of IDF heroes
Roi Klein HY"D (may God avenge his blood) and
Eliraz Peretz HY"D may not be included because aerial photos from 40 years ago (!) show
unidentified Arabs cultivating the land on which those homes are located.
Mayor Eliraz says that there is no justification for leaving these homes out of the authorization process. “Just because there are some aerial photos from 40 years ago indicating that the land [on which the six homes were built] was being worked is no reason to destroy the homes now. For one thing, no one is claiming ownership over the land! Secondly, when Eli was built, no one was working this land!”
These points were researched and brought to the court's attention by the legal advisor to the Samarian Regional Council, who pointed out that despite concerted efforts by left-wing groups to find claimants, no Arab has stepped forward to claim the land. This, he said, makes it highly likely that the cultivation 40 years ago was done by usurpers and not owners and should therefore be considered ownerless by default. Chief Justice Dorit Beinisch responded that any land in Judea and Samaria that was once cultivated, no matter how long ago and no matter if unclaimed, must be Arab by default.
ayor Eliraz brought out a third, more basic point - namely, that the homes need not be razed under any circumstances: "If someone ever comes forward and proves ownership, there are many acceptable ways of compensating him – with no need to destroy the homes. Can you imagine if someone would come with a photo showing that his grandfather’s grandfather worked the land on which the Azrieli Towers in Tel Aviv now stand – would they destroy the building? Of course not. They would simply pay fair compensation.”
Since no Arab has come forward to claim the land and demand that the homes be razed, the radical-left Peace Now organization has done so instead, bringing the matter to the Supreme Court. The court is to issue its ruling in the near future, in which it will weigh the State’s declaration of intent to legalize and authorize the homes and the entire town with Peace Now’s claim that the homes were built without authorization.
Is there any other country in the Western world where this sort of thing would not be covered by eminent domain? Absurd. Totally absurd.
Labels: Eliraz Peretz, eminent domain, HaYovel neighborhood of Eli, Roi Klein
