High Court reissues order for IDF to raze wall near Hebron

High Court reissues order for IDF to raze wall near Hebron
By Amos Harel, Haaretz Correspondent
Mon., July 30, 2007 Av 15, 5767

The High Court ordered the Israel Defense Forces on Tuesday to dismantle a concrete barrier near Hebron within two weeks.

The order comes one day after the court ruled that the IDF deliberately delayed the implementation of an earlier ruling to do so.

Supreme Court Chief Justice Dorit Beinisch instructed the army to implement a ruling made in December 2006, which required the army to remove within six months a concrete wall running along Route 317, south of Hebron.

The 2006 ruling came in response to a petition filed by the Association for Civil Rights in Israel along with Arab inhabitants of nearby villages.

The court's ruling last December accepted the petitioners' claims that the barrier, 82 centimeters tall and 41 kilometers long, was an attempt to defy a previous ruling preventing the state from constructing the separation fence along the road.

The High court also issued Tuesday severe criticism of the state's foot-dragging on the issue. It gave the IDF a week to destroy the barrier, and a further week to remove its remains from the road.

On Monday Beinisch said that the IDF deliberately delayed implementing the 2006 ruling. This was after the court reexamined the issue, following complaints by petitioners that the state had not carried out the court's instructions.

"The court ruled to remove the wall. This is no way to treat the court," Beinisch told the state prosecutors. "The state issued an order on the matter. Why was it not followed? I am struggling to understand the method that you chose to pursue."

Justice Ayala Procaccia added that

"if this is how the state treats court rulings, what can we expect from the ordinary citizen? What message are you interested in sending here?"

According to petitioners, the smaller concrete wall was set up to obstruct Palestinian shepherds from crossing the road with their herds of livestock. The petitioners claim this was done to keep the area east of Route 317 under the control of Jewish settlers.

The court rejected the state's claims that the barrier was meant to protect drivers and prevent them from sliding off the road, and gave the army six months to dismantle it. The court added that the state could find alternative solutions, but only after the barrier was dismantled.

However, 48 hours before the six-month period the court had afforded it to dismantle the wall, the state requested an extension, explaining it had come up with an alternative solution. This solution had in fact already been rejected by the court: The defense establishment proposed to put gaps in the wall at fixed intervals of 200 meters.

Meanwhile, the petitioners requested that the court hold the state in contempt for failing to meet the court's deadline for removing the wall. The court is expected to rule on the matter today. Sources who are involved in the case said they expected the court to order the state to destroy the wall immediately.

Surprisingly, former adviser to the defense minister, Hagai Alon, who sided with the calls to dismantle the wall, said its destruction would be unfortunate.

"This unnecessary barrier cost hundreds of millions of shekels that came out of the budget for no reason, because the IDF tried to cite security needs to explain a political move," he said.

Supreme Court President Dorit Beinisch.