Outpost bill makes return to Knesset after coalition overrides opposition objections

The Knesset was to begin a week-long debate Tuesday on a controversial bill to legalize some 4,000 homes in West Bank settlements built on privately owned Palestinian land, after coalition lawmakers used a clause in the Knesset regulations to override the opposition’s request for over a month of deliberations.

The legislation, known as the Regulation Bill, was originally scheduled to pass into law on Monday evening. However, opposition MKs sought to introduce hundreds of revisions to the bill and requested 38 days of debate on the legislation, plus an additional two days for voting. The vote was then pushed off until a compromise on the time frame was reached.

Due to the stalemate, Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit informed the powerful Knesset House Committee — tasked with setting which bills come up in the plenum — it may use Clause 98 if a compromise could not be reached. The clause is a provision that allows for the significant shortening of a period of debate for a given piece of legislation.

Israel Radio reported Tuesday morning that with the coalition’s implementation of Clause 98, the bill will be introduced in the plenum that afternoon for a debate that will run until 9 a.m. Wednesday morning. At that point, the Knesset will determine the schedule for further deliberations to run until Thursday morning. The bill is scheduled to be brought before the plenum next Monday for its second and third readings.

Coalition chairman David Bitan told Israel Radio that the opposition’s intransigence forced the coalition to resort to Clause 98.

The “meaningless reservations that were presented by [the opposition],” were what “obliged [the coalition] to use Clause 98 of the regulations to prevent the debasement of the Knesset,” Bitan said.

Zionist Union MK Merav Michaeli, chair of the opposition, accused the coalition of acting out of cowardice and refusing to hear any dissent on the legislation.

“If it were not enough that the coalition is bringing forward an illegal law, they don’t have the bravery to hear a true debate and to listen to the destructive results of this law,” Michaeli told Israel Radio.

Condemned by the Obama administration, the European Union, the United Nations and Israel’s attorney general, the so-called Regulation Law is being hailed by the settler movement as a turning point in the 50-year settlement project. Once passed, supporters say, the era of evacuating Jewish settlements will be over, though the measure will not cover the doomed Amona outpost, slated for evacuation by early next month.

The legislation had been taken off the Knesset slate late last year, as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reportedly waited for Obama to leave office. On Sunday, he announced it would come back for a vote this week.

The final draft of the bill outlines the procedures for legalizing unauthorized construction on private land and compensating the Palestinian landowners. It also immediately freezes administrative proceedings in 16 West Bank settlements for a period of 12 months. As the text stands, it does not apply to buildings that have received final demolition orders from Israeli courts, effectively excluding the outpost of Amona, which is set to be razed by next Wednesday.

The proposed bill stipulates that settlement construction in the West Bank that was carried out in good faith, without knowledge that the land was privately owned, would be recognized by the government, provided the settlers show some kind of state support in establishing themselves at the site. This support could in some cases be as minimal as having access to public infrastructure.

Under the terms of the bill, the government will be able to appropriate land for its own use if the owners are unknown. If the owners are known, they will be eligible for either yearly damages amounting to 125 percent of the value of leasing the land, a larger financial package valued at 20 years’ worth of leasing the plots, or alternate plots.

Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit has warned that the Regulation Bill breaches both local and international law, and indicated that the High Court was likely to strike it down. Some officials, including Netanyahu himself, have also warned that the law could see Israeli officials brought before the International Criminal Court in The Hague.

Marissa Newman and Raoul Wootliff contributed to this report.