BICOM

Residents of the disputed Hebron house, ‘Beit Hamachpela’ must evacuate by 25 April, legal officials said Wednesday morning.

Following a late-night meeting between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Defence minister Ehud Barak, Minister for Strategic Affairs Moshe Yaalon and Minister without portfolio Benny Begin, it was decided that if the sale proved illegal, the eviction would take place in 25 days, according to  Channel 10 News.

At 3 pm Tuesday, a deadline set by the Israeli military authorities for the settlers residing in Beit Hamachpela to file purchase permits with the Defence Ministry passed, but ministry officials said they would decide when to conduct the eviction according to ‘operational considerations.’

Netanyahu told a news conference in Jerusalem on Tuesday that he had asked Barak to postpone the eviction while the case was being investigated. He did not say how long that would take, but that he and Barak were “coordinated” on their handling of the affair.

In the evacuation order issued Monday, the Civil Administration said they were evicting the settlers because they had not sought the necessary permits to authenticate the sale. However, in the evacuation order, the civil administration added the permits were not the only issues. The settlers’ presence in the apartment building could upset the fragile status quo in the city between Israelis and Palestinians, and could create friction between the two groups, the administration said. The building is located in a Palestinian neighbourhood in a section of Hebron under Israeli military control, adjacent to the Cave of the Patriarchs