With every passing day, the nature of the criminal activity that characterized the conduct of construction company Heftsiba's managers and owners is becoming clearer.
A first hint to the company's conduct and its flawed norms could be detected a year and a half ago, after Heftsiba's illegal activity in the Modi'in Illit settlement was exposed.
The heavy price for violations of the law and illegal construction undertaken by the company in the settlement, located near the Palestinian village of Bil'in, is being paid to this day by thousands of people who purchased apartments in the project and were left without their money and without a home.
As part of an economic-political worldview where the law does not apply beyond the Green Line, in 2004 Heftsiba along with other real-estate companies started building the Matityahu East neighborhood located in the Modi'in Illit settlement.
The sin of ambition
The neighborhood construction project started in sin, after Israel slyly designated land belonging to the village of Bil'in as national land and approved the construction of a settlement there. Construction companies and the local council joined forces in order to approve an ambitious project, without granting anyone the right to appeal.
The entire approval process for the new neighborhood was undertaken hastily and covertly, in order to prevent objections and an in-depth discussion regarding ownership of the land in question.
Moreover, the approval of the plan to build hundreds of residential units in the neighborhood, granted by the supreme planning committee, deviated from the jurisdiction of the regional council and was undertaken in violation of the law, without any authority.
These violations were committed in order to assist Heftsiba and other construction companies in expanding the project, and instead of building 1,500 residential units, the company started to build and market 3,000 units, double the number approved initially.
Attorney Gilad Rogel, the legal advisor to the local council, characterized the situation well when he wrote to the council's chief engineer: "These days, colossal construction violations are being committed in broad daylight."
After a petition was filed, the High Court of Justice accepted the claims brought up by residents of Bil'in and the Peace Now movement, and issued an injunction order against the continuation of work and population of the homes.
Commercial occupation
We can assume that no construction company, including Heftsiba, would have dared to adopt similar methods and build thousands of apartments in violation of the law if this happened inside Israel.
Yet the moment we're talking about the West Bank, the law is breached, enforcement is almost completely lacking, and there is no difficulty in taking advantage of the Palestinians' weakness in order to steal their private land.
In the case of the Matityahu East neighborhood located in the settlement of Modi'in Illit, we're not talking about ideological occupation or a moral war for the people of Israel's right for the land. In this case we're talking about commercial occupation that aims to exploit the current situation in order to derive financial profits, on the backs of the Palestinians and in violation of the law.
The price of this lawlessness is paid by hundreds of home buyers and their families, who believed the hard-working Heftsiba salespeople and purchased, without their knowledge, assets that were built without permits, on private Palestinian land, and in violation of the law.
It is no wonder that a company like Heftsiba, which used all means at its disposal in order to steal and abandon residents of the village of Bil'in, is now abandoning its own clients, who have been deceived and left empty-handed.
Yet Heftsiba and its managers are not the only guilty party, as authorities, government ministries, and the Civil Administration office also bear responsibility for the failure. The lack of action, absence of enforcement, and failure to stop the project on time allowed an impossible situation to take shape, and now the State must stand by home buyers and assist in compensating them.
The State must not deny the suffering and distress of thousands of clients who were deceived and purchased an apartment in an illegal project.
The Matityahu East neighborhood must serve as a warning sign to any political body or business enterprise that seeks to do whatever it wishes in the territories and ignore the law.
Hopefully, the criminal investigation into the affair will culminate in bringing the responsible parties to justice and utilizing the full force of the law against those involved in the affair, who crudely violated the law and abandoned hundreds of families.