Ehud Barak
Ehud BarakFlash90



MKs and activists on Friday congratulated the Ministry for what appeared to be a promise to the High Court to issue an authorization for the homes in the neighborhood, which would prevent their being demolished.

Defense Minister Ehud Barak's office said Saturday night that his office's policy on the Yovel and Haresha neighborhoods has not changed, and that they are not about to receive blanket official authorization that would legalize their status – despite rumors to that effect.

MKs and activists on Friday congratulated the Ministry for what appeared to be a promise to the High Court to issue an authorization for the homes in the neighborhood, which would prevent their being demolished at the end of May, as the Ministry is planning.

Eitan Broshi, Barak's assistant for settlement matters, wrote in a note to the Court on Friday that the government was considering such an authorization. Mks Ze'ev Elkin and Aryeh Eldad, the heads of the Land of Israel Lobby in the Knesset, issued a statement congratulating Barak and Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu for their “dramatic change in attitude to the process of building in Judea and Samaria, creating procedures which would enable construction there to proceed as it does in the rest of the country.”

But in a statement Saturday night, Barak's office said that there would be no change in policy. “In January 2010 the Ministry informed the Court that it planned to conduct a survey of property, and the note to the Court Friday stated that the survey would continue. Homes that the survey determines were built on private property will be demolished, and we will consider the legalization of homes built on state land. As such, the reports on the imminent legalization of the Yovel and Harsha neighborhoods is incorrect,” the statement said.