Mitzpe Kramim (Hebrew:מצפה כרמים, lit.Vineyards Lookout) is anIsraeli outpost in theWest Bank. Located on a mountain ridge overlooking theJordan Valley, it falls under the jurisdiction of theMateh Binyamin Regional Council.[citation needed]
It is built, as ruled by theIsraeli Supreme Court on 25 August 2020, on private lands owned by residents of thePalestinian village ofDeir Jarir.[1] The international community considersanyIsraeli settlements in the West Bankillegal under international law, but the Israeli government disputes this.[2]
According to the Hebrew web site of the Local Regional Council, 42 families live in Mitzpe Kramim as of July 2022.[3]
Mitzpe Keramim was established in 1999 on theIsraeli Independence Day near theIsraeli settlement ofKokhav HaShahar. Several second-generation families from Kokhav HaShahar left their homes and moved to a hill south of the village.
Less than a year later, after an agreement with theEhud Barak government, the group was relocated to a hilltop closer to Kokhav HaShahar. However, only a few months later, a new village,Ma'ale Shlomo, was established on the original site.[citation needed]
In 2011, a group ofPalestinians from the village of Deir Jarir claiming ownership over the land on which the outpost sits, submitted a petition to theHigh Court of Justice to have the community of some 40 families removed.[4] AJerusalemDistrict Court judge ruled in 2018 that the settlement doesn't need to be razed because it was built "in good faith" and the residents have rights to the property.
The decision was based on a policy known as "market regulation" that is used in Israeli Law whenever authorities grant building rights to unowned land and only after the building is up and residents live there, a claim is made on the land that was not known at the time of authorization.[4] ASupreme Court ruling from August 2020 overturned this decision but in July 2022 reversed its own decision and accepted the state's argument.[5]
According to the PalestinianApplied Research Institute–Jerusalem (ARIJ), Israeli settlers "forcefully seized" land from thePalestinian villages ofDeir Jarir[6] andKafr Malik[7] in order to build Mitzpe Kramim.
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