Israeli court rebukes state over illegal outposts

[Scurrilous]

<snip>

"An Israeli government effort to make good on a five-year-old commitment to the US and Palestinians to rein in settlement expansion in the West Bank is coming under legal fire at home.

Under the 2003 "road map" peace plan, Israel promised to remove about two dozen or so unauthorized hilltop outposts as a way to build confidence in Palestinian peace talks, but has so far avoided dismantling the outpost communities for fear of violent clashes with settlers.

This week, the government revealed a compromise reached with the settler leadership aimed at avoiding conflict: Migron, a flagship outpost of 40 families living in mobile homes near the Palestinian city of Ramallah, would be relocated to an already existing settlement.

But at a Supreme Court hearing Wednesday, justices sided with Palestinians who own the land at Migron. Their lawyers argued that the deal allows the government to avoid evacuation during the minimum three years it could take to build new homes.

"I don't believe that Migron will be moved," says Michael Sfard, a lawyer for the settlement watchdog group Peace Now, which represented the Palestinians. "All of these statements are only made to enable more extensions by the courts."

Clashes over settlement evacuations will carry extra political weight in the run-up to a Feb. 10 general election, especially for Defense Minister Ehud Barak, whose Labor Party is sagging in the polls and desperately needs votes from left-wing Israelis. Mr. Barak, who oversees Israel's military occupation of the West Bank, is already embroiled in a standoff over a house in Hebron that settlers moved into illegally in 1997 and which the Supreme Court last week said must be cleared.

"The legal system is closing in on the government," says Hebrew University political science professor Yaron Ezrahi. "And so is public expectation that the government will do something about it. Things are moving finally, maybe because of the election."

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A mockery, not a compromise

<snip>

"As a new American president prepares to take office, and as Israel prepares for national elections, the government of Israel has announced a "compromise" on the illegal West Bank outpost of Migron. The deal makes a mockery of government pledges to deal seriously with illegal settler activity. It also challenges the seriousness of Israel's commitment to achieving peace with the Palestinians. Understanding why requires a closer examination of the details hidden behind the announcement.

Here are the facts: In December 2006, the Israeli government admitted that Migron, the flagship of the outpost movement, was illegal - its residents little more than thieves squatting on Palestinian private property - and should be evacuated. After delaying action, to try to placate the settler law-breakers, the government has now arrived at a deal with settler leaders: the eventual relocation of Migron to a site that is part of the municipal area of the West Bank settlement of Adam.

This compromise reduces what should be a demonstration of Israel's seriousness about stopping illegal settler actions to nothing more than a mechanism for legalizing such actions. More ominously, it allows for a dangerous Israeli government precedent: expansion of a settlement located east of the security barrier and its eventual annexation to Jerusalem, something that would have grave consequences for the viability of the Israeli-Palestinian two-state solution.

Here's why: Adam is an isolated settlement of around 2,500 residents, located far northeast of Jerusalem. Its built-up area is about four miles from the Green Line and about one mile from the municipal boundary of Jerusalem. But these numbers are not the whole story. Near Adam, the security barrier dips deep into the West Bank, leaving Adam on the West Bank side while effectively annexing nearly all the open land west of it - around 450 acres - to Israel.

Critics warned that the only justification for this gerrymandering was political: to clear the way for settlement construction that would link Adam to Jerusalem, while blocking any Palestinian development in the area.

And sure enough, in March 2007, Plan 240/3 surfaced, under which Adam would be massively expanded onto the annexed land. The planned construction would accommodate more than 1,000 new units, intended to house more than 5,000 settlers. It would leave Adam straddling the barrier, and create a contiguous block of Jewish settlement stretching west from Adam to the large Jerusalem settlement of Neve Ya'akov, located more than four miles away. With this accomplished, the re-routing of the security barrier to take in the rest of Adam would be a virtual fait accompli."

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[LeftishBrit]

1. Good for the Supreme Court!

[henank]

3. Good for the Magistrate's Court too

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3631464,00.html">Court rules rightist Noam Federman won't be banned from home

The Jerusalem Magistrate's Court on Monday rejected the State Prosecutor's Office's petition to have extreme right-wing activist Noam Federman banned from the West Bank.

The petition followed an indictment that filed against Federman for assaulting police officers during the evacuation of his house about six weeks ago.

In her ruling, Justice Shulamit Dotan criticized the police and State Prosecutor's Office, saying the nature of the actions ascribed to Federman was not severe and that the circumstances of the offense did not imply that he is dangerous.

...snip...

The State turned to the Magistrate's Court, which refused to accept the appeal instantaneously and said it would take time to reach a decision. A request for a temporary ban, until a decision is made on the matter, was rejected by the judge.

The State Prosecutor's Office petitioned the District Court, which criticized its actions.

Judge Moshe Drori rejected the State's appeal and wrote, "The State's request to ban this person from remaining in the Judea and Samaria area bears severe discrimination, as there is not one example throughout Israeli law in which a person was banned from living in an entire region due to his involvement in violence against police officers.

"There is no doubt that the person who was beaten in all parts of his body in that 'violent' incident is this man rather than the policemen," the judge added, refusing to issue the requested injunction.

[Violet_Crumble]

5. Why would anyone who's not a right-wing extremist be cheering for Federman?

The man is a repulsive individual, a former leader of the now outlawed Kach party, and has been linked to terrorism. Why on earth would anyone in their right mind think it's a *win* to allow this creature to remain in the West Bank to terrorise Palestinian civilians?

[Violet_Crumble]

2. A blast from the past...

Olmert to assure Bush he will remove outposts 'expeditiously'

Israel will tell U.S. President George W. Bush during his visit to the
region this week that it is committed to acting expeditiously to dismantle unauthorized West Bank settlement outposts, a spokesman for Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said Monday.

Israel has pledged repeatedly to take action on the outposts, generally small encampments settlers have set up in the West Bank.

Olmert spokesman Mark Regev did not say how quickly Israel would take down the dozens of outposts.

Israel first pledged to remove West Bank outposts in 2003, under the U.S.-backed road map peace plan. That plan, however, stalled shortly after it was launched because Israel and the Palestinians failed to honor initial obligations.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/942129.html

I could swear there was a long-lived thread regarding Olmert's 'promise' to remove outposts, but now for the life of me I can't find it...

[shira]

4. what? what is this.......?

But at a Supreme Court hearing Wednesday, justices sided with Palestinians who own the land at Migron. Their lawyers argued that the deal allows the government to avoid evacuation during the minimum three years it could take to build new homes.

Palestinians getting justice in court?

but, but....I thought Israel was racist, practicing slow-mo genocide, apartheid,...how does this happen in such an oppressive and evil regime?



ps
hooray for justice!