Almost a year after the cabinet unanimously approved a plan to build 8,000-dunam (2,000-acre) Ayalon Park in southeastern Tel Aviv, petitions against the plan have been filed at the High Court of Justice.
Due to differences between them, Mikve-Israel Agricultural School and Alliance All Israel Friends High School filed separate petitions at the High Court of Justice. Hazera Genetics (TASE: HQS) also filed a petition.
The petitioners all assert that the planned park is too large and impractical, is harmful to neighborhoods in southern Tel Aviv, and violates their property rights. Alliance All Friends and Hazera also propose residential and business construction plans, which they allege are the only way that the park can be built.
The State Attorney’s Office asserts that the government has full authority to decide the plan on behalf of the residents of Tel Aviv and the region. The state alleges that the petitioners’ motive is not the benefit of the residents of southern Tel Aviv, but real estate profits at the public’s expense.
Mikve-Israel Agricultural School covers 3,300 dunam (825 acres), which the Ottoman sultan granted to Charles Netter and Alliance Israelite Universelle in 1870 in order to found an agricultural high school.
Published by Globes [online] - www.globes.co.il - on January 8, 2006