As a result of a ACRI’s written correspondence with the Israel Lands Authority and the Attorney General to protest a scheduled meeting to discuss a number of pivotal and far-reaching issues relating to the equitable distribution of state land resources, the Attorney General issued a ruling stating that decisions taken by the ILA, regarding the building and employment rights for agricultural land (according to the recommendations of the Haber Committee), will remain pending until the final authorization of the next Minister of Finance, and will not be subject to the authority of the current Minister of Finance, Ehud Olmert. In his decision, Mr. Mazuz ruled that although the fact that Mr. Olmert’s is both Minister of Finance and Chairman of the Israel Lands Authority is not actually illegal, it is “undesirable”. The following is a translation of a letter sent by ACRI Attorneys Sharon Abraham-Weiss, and Chen Tirosh from the Association for Distributive Justice:
LAND FORUM
The Association for Civil Rights in Israel
The Association for Distributive Justice
Israel Union for Environmental Defense
Bimkom – Planners for Planning Rights
The Mizrahi Democratic Rainbow-New Discourse
To:
The Attorney General
Mr. Mani Mazuz
29 Salah al-Din St.
Jerusalem
The Director of Israel Lands Authority
Minister Ehud Olmert
1 Kaplan St.
Jerusalem
Re: The meeting held by the Israel Lands Authority (ILA) on 11.1.06
1. We are writing to you in the name of the Land Forum which is made up of a number of social change organizations who are working together to ensure the equitable distribution of Israeli state land and its management, while guaranteeing the protection of human rights and appropriate planning principles.
2. On 11.1.06 the ILA will hold a meeting whose agenda includes a number of principled issues with far-reaching implications, including the planned ILA reforms (the recommendations of the Gadish Committee), building and employment rights for agricultural land (according to the recommendations of the Haber Committee), the level of compensation for farmers in the event of a change in the designated purpose of agricultural land (ILA decision 969), and more.
3. In light of the existing circumstances, which will be detailed below, we believe that the meeting should be cancelled, or at the very least, the council should remove the discussion of the Gadish committee recommendations from the agenda and similarly recommendation 969 of the Haber Committee.
The holding of the meeting and the decision-making process associated with the weighty issues under deliberation are unreasonable, do not comply with the principles of lawful government, and raise fears of opportunistic decision-making for crucial decisions.
It should be emphasized that in the written response from the Attorney General to The Association for Equitable Land Distribution on 8.1.2006, the Attorney General notes that under certain circumstances decisions by the ILA relating to principled issues should be delayed until the election and the founding of a new government.
There can be no doubt that the decisions that are likely to be taken by the ILA when it next convenes are crucial by any criterion.
The following is a brief overview of the most poignant reasons that the ILA should not discuss these issues in the upcoming meeting:
A. The conflict of interests on the part of Minister Olmert, and the close proximity to the upcoming elections
4. Minister Ehud Olmert is currently both the Chairman of the ILA, and the appointed minister, on behalf of the incumbent government, in charge of issues relating to the ILA. Concomitant to which, Minister Olmert is also acting Minister of Finance. Clause 40(c) of the Budget Principles Law 1985, stipulates that decisions by the ILA relating to the leasing of land which impact on the state budget, are dependent upon the authorization of the Minister of Finance.
The rationale for this, of course, is the need for a moderating and supervisory body, on behalf of the government, that is able to monitor decisions taken by the ILA which impact on public funds, like the long list of issues that are due to be deliberated on at the ILA meeting tomorrow, which have direct implications for the state budget. In the current situation, in which Minister Olmert is acting ILA chairman and Minister of Finance, there is no moderating government force supervising ILA decisions or their budgetary ramifications.
5. As previously mentioned, the current state of affairs is particularly grave in light of its timing: on the eve of general elections and in the absence of the Prime Minister. The fear of electoral opportunism and the emptying of the public purse, without any supervisory body, is particularly palpable.
6. It should also be noted that the Attorney General believes that the present situation is undesirable, but in view of the Knesset`s refusal to authorize the transfer of responsibility for the ILA to another minister, Minister Olmert retains his dual role. As previously mentioned in the letter of 8.1.2006, Adv. Limor Bruchim, in the name of the Attorney General, wrote the following to the Association for Distributive Justice (the bolding was not in the original):
“The Attorney General has issued instructions to continue the examination of a possible transferal of authority as previously mentioned. If the government is unsuccessful in this pursuit, the required decisions will be assessed on their own merits, and the need for a delay in the taking of principled decisions until after the general elections and the founding of a new government, will be considered. “
B. The general public was given no opportunity to react to, or participate in, the decision-making process
7. An additional problem that should be taken into consideration is that despite the fact that the ILA is expected to discuss a series of issues with far-reaching implications for the Israeli public and the character of the State, such as: the implications of the Gadish committee findings in relation to a person or persons leasing land in urban areas, or the recommendations of the Haber Committee on those leasing land in the agricultural sector, the public has not been given sufficient opportunity to study the proposals and to react to them.
8. According to the ILA decisions 1008 and 1055, the Authority must post the meeting’s agenda and the proposals to be discussed on their Internet site at least six days before the convening of the meeting. However, the agenda for the upcoming meeting was only posted on the Internet three days before, on 8.1.06, which left only two days for the public to respond.
C. The authority`s decision is not based on a substantive body of evidence
9. In addition to the long list of flaws in the operative methods of the ILA, that should prevent the assembly tomorrow, should be added the content of the decisions to be decided upon. An example of which are all aspects of the recommendations by the Haber Committee which pertain to the building rights for residential housing and businesses on privately owned agricultural land, and the potential “whitewashing” of building infractions for financial gain on this same land. The necessity for this, according to statements made by the committee, are a result of, among other things, the deteriorating physical and demographic situation of the agricultural communities, and the agricultural crisis.
We feel that the committees` recommendations were taken with no evidentiary basis. On close examination of the recommendations it is apparent that no substantive evidence was placed before the committee to facilitate its decision-making on a number of issues, including: the physical and demographic state of the agricultural communal settlements; the employment situation in these same areas; the collated findings of the supervisory branch of the ILA regarding the full scale of illegal construction in these settlements, with a clear reference to how many of them are rented by a third party in contravention to the ILA decision currently in force; the budgetary implications of the recommendations, including the value of the financial benefits that were granted to the agricultural sector such as, the partial collection of fines issued for illegal construction and the non-collection of profits gained by illegal land usage, the number and scope of anticipated land deals; the planning and environmental implications of the recommendations; data regarding the current building status in the agricultural communal settlements and their agricultural or non-agricultural usage; and more.
Thus one can only wonder at the committee`s recommendation to allow every agriculturist to become a small-time land dealer at the public’s expense as a means of addressing the “agricultural crisis”, when the Israeli agricultural export grew in 2005 by close to 20%, and is currently valued at approximately a billion dollars.
10. As in all decisions that relate to individual clauses of the Budget Law or economic strategy, the budgetary price of each clause is calculated and the section of the state budget from which the money is to be derived, identified, thus enabling an effective assessment of its impact vis-à-vis the full complement of the state’s resources. The same system should be applied to the Haber Committees` recommendations, or any other decision of the ILA that incur great expense for the state. This is even more important at a time of financial hardship, when every clause relating to social security, education, and many other areas, are being mercilessly cut to minimize state expenditure.
11. We therefore call for a delay of the upcoming ILA committee meeting. As detailed above, the convening of the ILA and the taking of decisions on issues on their agenda, under the present circumstances, is unreasonable and inappropriate, and raises fears of electoral opportunism and administrative management that is neither lawful nor correct.
Adv. Chen Tirosh
The Association for Distributive Justice
Adv. Sharon Abraham-Weiss
The Association for Civil Rights in Israel
last updated : 06/03/06
