Israel’s High Court Orders Eviction of Jewish Group

JERUSALEM — Israel’s Supreme Court on Thursday ordered the eviction of Jewish settlers who stirred an international outcry by moving into a building in the Christian Quarter of Jerusalem’s Old City.

In its ruling, the three-judge panel said the settlers, affiliated with the Ateret Cohanim seminary, must leave by Tuesday. The settlers said they will comply. A lower court earlier ordered them to leave, but the order was appealed and had never been enforced.

Officials of the Greek Orthodox Church, which owns the building, said they are still dissatisfied because Thursday’s ruling allows maintenance workers and 20 guards hired by the settlers to remain until a lower court resolves the tenancy dispute.

The church argues that the settlers are in the building under an illegal sublease. It reaffirmed plans to close all Christian shrines in the Holy Land today to protest the presence of the settlers.

The Jewish settlers moved into the Hospice of St. John complex during Easter Week. The action brought protests from Christian clerics, Palestinian Christians and Muslims, the U.S. State Department and pro-Israeli lobby groups.

On Sunday, it was disclosed that the Israeli government had funneled $1.8 million through a Panamanian company to help pay for the hospice lease. The government contends that Jews have the right to live anywhere in Israel.

The walled Old City has traditionally been divided into Muslim, Christian, Jewish and Armenian quarters, each with holy sites.

Avraham Sochovolsky, attorney for the Greek Orthodox church, claimed victory in the Supreme Court ruling. “Twenty people is not a settlement,” he said.

But a church spokesman, Bishop Timothy Margaritis, said the court did not go far enough.

“We were expecting that the building would be evacuated completely and that somebody else would undertake to guard the place,” he said. “Now, it’s like recognizing the rights of the Panamanian company.”

The Panama-based company SBC says it subleased St. John’s from an Armenian Christian and that the settlers are its guests. But the church says the Christian involved had no right to sublet. It has filed separate eviction orders against him and SBC.

In a related action, the U.S. State Department said it was “dismayed by reports” that Israel started two new settlements in the occupied territories. Construction has been going on at Dugit in the Gaza Strip and Allon in the West Bank.