Ayelet Shaked seeks to organize status of West Bank settlements by establishing a committee that would provide legal solutions to issue of land ownership.
Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked of Bayit Yehudi has recently begun the process of establishing a committee to organize the legal status of land plots in the West Bank. According to Shaked, the committee’s establishment means residents of the West Bank will cease fearing the threat of land ownership disputes.
The coalition agreement between Bayit Yehudi and Likud includes a clause which calls for establishing a professional panel that would discuss proposals seeking to organize the status of buildings and neighborhoods within Jewish settlements in the West Bank with the relevant authorities.
According to the clause in the agreement, the panel must submit its findings to the government within 60 days of its establishment, which the government will then act to implement.
The committee is currently in the process of being established, and will be led by Cabinet Secretary Avichai Mendelblatt. The team will include Director General of the Agriculture Ministry Shlomo Ben Eliyahu, the legal adviser to the Ministry of Defense Ahaz Ben-Ari, and Dr. Hagai Vinitski.
The status of land plots in the West Bank is legally ambiguous. There have been several legal commentaries that seek to answer crucial questions like which lands are considered private, and what proof is necessary in order to establish private ownership of the land. The state has been struggling to reach any conclusions on the matter for years, and many plots of land have remained without a clear legal status.
The committee is meant to find solutions to organize the issue of settlement and to solve disputes over land ownership.
“There are many areas in Judea and Samaria, whose legal status has not been organized,” Shaked said. “Its time to remove the legal ambiguity, and allow the residents of Judea and Samaria, many of whom live in settlements that where built by the Israeli government, to live without the persistent fear of challenges to their property ownership,” she concluded.
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