The United Nations, European Union and Israeli human rights teams all criticized the court docket determination on Thursday.

Lynn Hastings, the United Nations resident and humanitarian coordinator within the Occupied Palestinian Territory, stated the Palestinian petitioners, having exhausted home felony treatments, are actually “unprotected and vulnerable to approaching displacement.”

She known as on Israel “to stop demolitions and evictions within the Occupied Palestinian Territories, in step with its tasks underneath global legislation.”

The European Union stated evicting the Palestinians would quantity to “forcible switch from their houses and destruction in their communities,” which it stated was once prohibited underneath global legislation.

“As the occupying energy, Israel has the duty to offer protection to the Palestinian inhabitants and now not displace it,” the European bloc stated.

And the Association for Civil Rights in Israel — which represented the Palestinian villagers in court docket — accused the court docket of approving a transfer that might “depart households, kids and aged with no roof over their heads.” It stated the ruling was once “strange and would elevate critical penalties.”

Aerial pictures

Evicting the Palestinian citizens would separate Hebron from different villages at the southern outskirts of the town.

High Court Justices David Mintz, Ofer Grosskopf and Isaac Amit Wednesday now not handiest rejected claims by way of the Palestinians that that they had been residing within the house earlier than 1981 however ordered each and every of them to pay 20,000 shekels ($5,900) in bills.

“We by no means believed that Israeli courts would deliver us justice. The determination was once now not a marvel to any people,” council chief Abu Younis stated.

“We, the households of Masafer, have papers that turn out our possession of our land,” he insisted.

The High Court rejected that statement.

The Masafer Yatta households introduced aerial pictures as evidence that the villages had existed within the house for 45 years. But Israel argued that Palestinian citizens started squatting within the house after it was once declared Firing Zone 918, and that till then it was once handiest used as seasonal pasture land for his or her farm animals.

Justice Mintz stated within the court docket verdict that the query of whether or not the realm was once a spot of everlasting place of abode is “now not difficult in any respect,” since aerial pictures from the realm previous to 1980 displays no indication of a residential presence there. Mintz additionally famous that the realm was once utilized by the air pressure to behavior simulated airstrikes within the Nineteen Nineties.

The court docket rejected the declare that turning the realm right into a closed army zone was once opposite to global legislation, and stated that once global legislation contradicts Israeli legislation, the latter prevails.

The Palestinians argued that they and their households had been residing in those villages, whose houses are constructed inside of herbal caves, since earlier than Israel was once established in 1948.

While the Israeli army declared the realm to be a firing zone in 1981, citizens remained reasonably undisturbed till the overdue Nineteen Nineties, consistent with the High Court ruling.

But in 1999, the army and the Civil Administration evicted greater than 700 citizens.

The army scaled again the dimensions of the proposed firing zone in April 2012, at which level Israel asked that 8 villages be demolished, as a substitute of 12.

The High Court then steered that the Palestinians withdraw their felony motion, however two different petitions have been submitted in 2013. The court docket disregarded them.

In its ruling, the High Court approved the army’s place that the land was once essential for its wishes.

Abu Younis stated Friday the villagers would proceed to withstand, regardless of the felony defeat.

“Soldiers evacuated the citizens of the villages by way of vehicles to different spaces [in 1999], however the citizens returned at the identical night time in opposition to the need of the profession,” he stated, relating to Israel. “The identical will occur if this court docket determination turns into truth.”