The Israel Land Authority (ILA) planning authorizations committee decided in October 2014 to go ahead with a framework plan for a new city in the Jerusalem hills in the area between Jerusalem and Beit Shemesh, to include Tzur Hadassah and Mevo Beitar. The new city will be called Bat Harim. The decision aroused the ire of the environmental organizations, which assert that it was illegal, and that these plans should be canceled.
A letter sent by the Society for the Preservation of Nature in Israel (SPNI) to the ILA legal advisor states that the initiative to found Bat Harim was rejected a number of times in the past, and was not included in National Outline Plan 35 or Regional Outline Plan 30/1, and claimed that the planning institutions saw no room for these initiatives in the framework of the housing solutions proposed for the Jerusalem area.
In its letter, SPNI quotes the 2007 decision by the National Planning and Building Commission to reject these initiatives, which said, "Based on the information presented to the Commission and the array of considerations brought up in discussion, including economic, social, demographic, and environmental considerations, the Commission believed that it was important to deliver a message of focusing on the existing municipal fabric, rather than expanding development areas to the west."
On Sunday, ILA will discuss the construction plans for the Jerusalem hills. Ahead of this discussion, Ministry of Environmental Protection director general David Leffler asked the Minister of the Interior and that Ministry's director general to cancel the plan immediately. "Expansion of Jerusalem westward by development geographically isolated from the city will require enormous investment in infrastructure, and cause damage to valuable open spaces and the Jerusalem public," Leffler wrote. "This expansion is wrong and opposed to trends recently led by the Israeli government. In view of the clear advantages of strengthening cities over decentralizing them,… I call on you to take immediate action to cancel the ill-advised initiatives being promoted for the area west of the city."
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on April 15, 2015
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