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Courts Postpone the eviction of Migron till after Ramadan

Today, 27/7/12, the Supreme Court partially accepted the request of the State to postpone the eviction of Migron.

The court instructed that all preparation for the eviction continue as planned, and set the time for another hearing after Ramadan.

Peace Now: “the Government surrenders to the settlers’ threats of use of violence and uses them as an excuse to postpone the eviction. We believe that the police investigation will soon show that the papers of the alleged land deal were forged.”

The court had to rule in two different requests, one by the State and another by the settlers.

On Sunday, 22/7/12, the State requested to postpone the eviction of Migron till the end of August, using two excuses: 1. security concerns of possible violence by settlers during Ramadan and 2. logistical problems according to which the alternative site for the settlers (the Winery Hill) will not be ready on time.

The Court ruled today that there should be another hearing on the 21st of August, and that till then the preparation for the eviction must continue.

The new settlement for the Migron settlers, July 2012 The second request was a new petition by the settlers asking to prevent the eviction of 17 of the houses in Migron based on a claim that some lands were bought by the settlers.

The State did not give an answer to the settlers’ request, and asked to postpone their answer till August 20th.

Meanwhile, the State declared in court that the police was investigating whether the land deal was based on forged documents.

The reason for the State’s indecisiveness became clear during the hearing in court.

The Ministerial Committee for Settlements decided to accept the settlers’ request and to consider the possibility to approve their settlement on the 3 parcels that were allegedly bought. However, the State Attorney argued that such a decision cannot be legal because there was a final ruling of the court ordering the government to dismantle all of Migron by August 1st, and the government had no authority to change this decision.

As a result of this dispute, the State Attorney asked the court to postpone the State’s answer till August 20th. The bottom line is that the settlers got a postponement of three weeks but Migron still should be evicted. In addition, the police are investigating the alleged land deal, and for now, the request of the settlers to exclude 17 houses from the eviction is not accepted neither by the State nor by the Court.