Likud Minister Miri Regev called on the government on Sunday to authorize the Amona outpost as non-governmental organization Peace Now pushed for the government to demolish the two modular structures that settlers placed there earlier this month.
Regev spoke in support of the outpost when she visited the outskirts of the site to attend a corner laying ceremony Sunday, in which a sign for Amona Farm was unveiled.
Earlier in the month, settlers placed two caravans there, stating that they had purchased four hectares (40 dunams) of property on the hilltop where the former Amona outpost had once stood.
“There is no reason why the people who purchased the property here shouldn’t be able to exercise their property right. They have not broken into property that is not theirs,” said Regev, who is Culture and Sports Minister.
There can be no “foot dragging here,” she said.
Binyamin Regional Council head Israel Ganz also attended the small Amona ceremony.
An attorney for Peace Now, Michael Sfard, on Sunday wrote a letter to Deputy State Prosecutor Nurit Littman and Attorney-General for Judea and Samaria, Col. Eval Toledano.
He called on them to open a criminal investigation into the placement of the caravans on the outpost, noting that a military injection existed that prevented the placement of modular structures on the property.
That investigation should also extend to those who broke the injunction preventing entry onto the site, Sfard said.
“We call on the law enforcement authorities to wake up and arrest the settlers and their elected officials who trample the law and exploit the events of recent days to promote delinquency and to inflame the area,” Peace Now said.
The organization added that Regev and MK Bezalel Smotrich, who have spoken in support of the new Amona outpost, “are not worthy of being elected officials.”
In 2017, the IDF forcibly evacuated more than 40 families from the Amona outpost in accordance with a High Court of Justice ruling, which stated that the outpost was built on private Palestinian property and must be destroyed.