The IDF Central District Commander issued administrative restraining orders to distance several Jewish civilians from their homes in the Samaria region for three months, the duration of the olive harvest.

The orders also prevent the recipients from staying in their own residences.

The restraining orders are to be implemented in three days if the recipients do not appeal them.

Administrative orders, a hold-over from pre-State British Mandatory law, allow the IDF to detain or limit the freedom of residents of Judea and Samaria without due process or judicial review. Such orders, which need not necessarily include any explicit charges, have been used to restrict the movement or to imprison both Arabs and Jews.

One of the Jewish residents of Samaria to be barred from his home by IDF order is Neriah Ofan, formerly a decorated soldier from the elite undercover Duvdevan unit. In recent years, Ofan has restored an ancient tradition by organizing marches around the walls of Jerusalem's Temple Mount on the eve of every Jewish calendar month.

Ofan received the order banning him from his home in Yitzhar after midnight last night.

"The establishment is pursuing those who threaten to replace it. I will continue to spread the word and wake people up in an effort to replace the regime with an authentic Jewish establishment," Ofan said.

The IDF banned Ofan from his home, along with 19 others, in 2006, again without any charges being placed and no due process. Prior to the 2005 Disengagement, Ofan was jailed without trial via administrative detention order due to fears by the government that his logistical skills in organizing the monthly encirclement of the Temple Mount were being used to organize opposition to the expulsion.

MK Uri Ariel (National Union) responded angrily to reports that the IDF has issued

Administrative orders for such purposes violates a Knesset decision.

administrative restraining orders. He said that the renewed use of administrative orders for such purposes violates a Knesset decision condemning such past use of state authority by the security establishment.

"The actions are even more severe in light of the fact that no such steps were taken against the Arabs and left-wing activists who uprooted 6,000 Jewish-owned vines near Nerya two months ago," MK Ariel said.

Baruch Marzel, chairman of the National Jewish Front party, which has yet to enter the Knesset, said, "We have returned to the dark days. Let the Central District Commander be a hero when it comes to fighting terrorists, not when it comes to fighting good Jews."