The High Court decided Sunday not to grant Arabs and leftists a temporary order to halt construction in the Givat HaBrecha neighborhood of Talmon, north of Jerusalem. Justice Fogelman's decision came two weeks after the court had granted the same petitioners a conditional order halting work at the site.
The petitioners, ultra-leftist group Yesh Din and the residents of Arab village Aljania, requested that the court halt the construction because the neighborhood's zoning approvals were supposedly illegal and infringed upon the Arabs' right to access their fields.
Yesh Din and the Arabs filed their motion several days before the Sukkot holiday. At that time, the anti-Jewish construction freeze in Judea and Samaria was still in force, and it was not possible to issue the necessary permits for construction.
Immediately upon the expiration of the freeze order, Attorney Akiva Sylvetsky, the local authority's legal adviser, instructed that the permits be issued. Sylvetsky argued before the court that construction at the site had become legal with the end of the ten-month freeze order, and that there was no justification for a temporary order against it.
The court accepted the defendant's position and ruled that work could continue until a final verdict on the motion is given.
The plans for Givat HaBrecha allow for the construction of 300 housing units, as well as public buildings. Eighty units have been populated and others are being built.