IDF commanders dispatched with legal niceties Wednesday and ordered the demolition of seven homes and a kindergarten in the Jewish community of Ma’aleh Rehava’am without waiting for the Supreme Court to rule on the matter.

An IDF legal adviser to the Civil Administration of Judea and Samaria informed Etzion Brigade Colonel Amit Yamin at midday he need not wait to confirm a Supreme Court restraining order against the demolitions in Gush Etzion.  Once Yamin gave the order, security forces moved fast and finished the demolitions before the Court had issued a restraining order.

Copy of Supreme Court restraining order against demolitions at Ma’aleh Rehavam in Gush Etzion. It says: “Do not carry out any actions that create irreversible consequences .”

An officer receives a call while waiting on site at Ma’aleh Rehavam prior to destroying homes and a kindergarten on Wednesday, May 14, 2014.

Early Wednesday, David Perl, head of the Gush Etzion Residents’ Council said that the Court had ordered a stay against the demolitions early in the morning after residents had submitted evidence of having purchased the land on which their homes were built. Those documents formed the basis for the appeal that is currently pending.

A spokesperson for the Supreme Court denied the claim, however, when asked for clarification by the IDF.

As a result, the IDF commander was told by legal counsel not to wait for confirmation. Rather, he was told to simply go ahead and destroy seven private homes and a kindergarten at Ma’ale Rehavam, according to a reporter from the Tazpit news agency on site. The AFP news agency reported that an additional three uninhabited structures were also destroyed.

The IDF officer proceeded to order his troops to demolish the buildings, leaving seven families with children homeless. Hundreds of security forces are on site at the community, where 34 families have built their homes.

“The demolition of homes is an expression of weakness and frailty of our hold in Israel,” Perl said in a statement following the destruction. “But we are not deterred and will not be silent We will continue to build and expand Gush Etzion roots everywhere. We came to this country to build and be built. The time has come to announce to the world our sovereignty over this land.”

Two more Jewish communities, both in Samaria, are slated for similar actions by the government wrecking crews this week: Ramat Gilad near Shechem (Nablus) and in Givat Asaf in the Binyamin region.

Similar demolition orders are rarely issued, let alone carried out against the thousands of illegally-constructed Bedouin and Arab structures dotting the Israeli landscape within the 1949 Armistice lines (known as the “pre-1967 lines.) They are never carried out against the hundreds of thousands carpeting the hillsides in the territory of Area C.

The US Supreme Court has agreed to examine the question as to whether or not an American citizen born in Jerusalem can have “Israel” listed on his (or her) passport as their country of birth.

The case is being brought on behalf of Jerusalem (Israel) born, Menachem Binyamin Zivotofsky, a US citizen. Zivotofsky’s parents tried to have Israel listed as his place of birth, but the US State Department didn’t allow it.

The constitutional question is whether only the President can allow Israel to be listed, something no president has allowed to happen so far, or if Congress can pass a law that overrides the president on what is claimed to be a foreign policy issue.

Congress actually passed the law in 2002 as part of the Foreign Relations Authorization Act, but it was never enforced.

As an aside, if an American child is born in Tel Aviv, the passport will say, “Israel” as the place of birth.

Strangely enough, it’s been reported that the Jerusalem Consulate did add the country name for a man born in Jerusalem before 1948, they wrote “Palestine”.

Of course that is very problematic, as there never was a state of Palestine.

At best, the correct location should have been, “British Mandate for Palestine” or even “League of Nations Occupied Turkey”.

The State Department’s and White House’s official policy has been to not recognize Israel’s sovereignty over Jerusalem.

Sounds very one-sided to me.

The case may be decided by June 2015.

The U.S. Supreme Court unanimously ruled Wednesday against a Minnesota rabbi who claimed he was cut from an airline’s frequent flier program for earning too many miles.

Rabbi Binyamin Ginsberg was one of Northwest Airlines’ top fliers when he was cut from its program in 2008. Northwest has since been absorbed by Delta.

The rabbi, who acquired his frequent flier miles by consulting with educational organizations throughout the country, says the airline was targeting top miles earners. Northwest counters that Ginsberg complained too frequently — 24 times in a seven-month period.

Ginsberg reached the highest level of the WorldPerks program in 2005 before being dropped from the program in 2008, after Northwest and Delta announced their merger.

He sued the airline, claiming breach of contract. The airline said its contract allowed it to cancel membership for abuse of the program.

The Tel Aviv District Court in one swoop has threatened Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s ability to carry out concessions to the Palestinian Authority, meaning U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, and also has made him vulnerable to a rebellion within his Likud party.

The ruling, virtually unnoticed or underplayed by most Israeli media, overthrows an internal Likud court decision that decreed that the head of the party’s Central Committee has the power to convene the committee on police issues, a power that Netanyahu wants only for himself.

The head of the committee happens to be one of Netanyahu’s’ most nationalist Knesset Members, Deputy Defense Minister Danny Danon.

After the internal Likud court overruled the Likud law committee’s decision backing Danon, he appealed to the Tel Aviv court and won his case on Monday. However, Prime Minister Netanyahu is not accepting defeat and will appeal to the Supreme Court.

That will be an interesting show. On the one hand, the High Court has a long history of ruling for democracy, in this case the claim by Danon and supported by the Tel Aviv court that Netanyahu is trying to take totalitarian control of the party.

On the other hand, if the High Court, which historically loves Peace Now and hates nationalists, upholds Danon’s claim, it could put in jeopardy Kerry’s juggernaut that has trampled over the Prime Minister. Netanyahu so far has refused to say “no” for fear of being blamed for standing up against President Barack Obama and wrecking his plan to pronounce instant peace in the Middle East with the creation of a new Palestinian Authority state within Israel’s own borders.

If Danon can convene the Central Committee on issues that Netanyahu wants to decide for himself, such as paving the way for expelling more than 150,000 Jews from Judea and Samaria, dividing Jerusalem and allowing NATO troops to protect Israel from Palestinian Authority terrorists, he could very well win the day and bury Kerry’s blind drive to rub Israel’s nose in the sand at Mahmoud Abbas’ feet.

The only obstacle to a full-scale rebellion within the Likud party is Netanyahu’s power to fire any Cabinet minister and deputy minister who gets in his way. The list is getting longer every day, including Danon, Tzipi Hotovely, Ze’ev Elkin, Yuval Steinitz and Miri Regev, among others.

If the Supreme Court does not change the lower court decision, Prime Minister Netanyahu can easily climb down from his limb, which is getting longer every day and where he is hanging much lonelier than ever, and tell President Obama that “democracy is democracy,” and, “Tough luck, pal.”

If the Likud committee votes its conscience and squashes proposed concessions, and if Prime Minister Netanyahu insists on walking on his knees with Washington, he could face political oblivion.

In 2005, the Liked Central committee voted overwhelmingly against a policy of expelling Jews from Gaza. When Sharon nevertheless tried to get his way in the Knesset Likud, formed the Kadima party and brought along most of the former Likud MKs who wanted their seats of power more than a clean conscience.

Netanyahu, who did not join the parade, does not have the clout that Sharon had.

Trying to for a new party and heading a center-left coalition would be political suicide

But having to swallow the dictates of the party Central Committee would leave him with less power.

Couldn’t happen to a nicer guy.

Finance Minister Yair Lapid on Wednesday froze the money going to Haredi yeshivas, following a Tuesday Supreme Court ruling that ordered the state to halt all payments to yeshivas whose students’ draft has been postponed.

Lapid instructed the Finance Ministry’s comptroller to freeze the payments, but on Thursday he issued a statement saying that, after discovering that the funds had already been sent to the Education Ministry, he convened an emergency meeting with his comptroller following which he ordered her to block those funds as well.

Lapid’s statement said that this was done in an effort to obey the high court’s ruling.

Now the two offices will be cooperating to separate the 18- to 20-year-old yeshiva students with an August draft postponement, who will not be paid, from the rest of the yeshiva students.

“These will no longer receive state funds,” said the Lapid statement. “Only once the Education Ministry’s examination of their cases is concluded will the Finance Ministry release the funds to those yeshiva students not included in the court ruling.”

The Supreme Court ruled on several appeals from so called good government groups. The court ordered government to issue an updated announcement by March 31 regarding the pay, saying the justices might issue a new decision should the Knesset not come up with new legislation by then.

Meanwhile, the justices have prohibited government to transfer any funds “intended to support Torah institution students born in 1994, 95 and the first half of 96, who received their draft date starting in August, 2013, and who have not shown up to be drafted based on general decisions to postpone their draft made by the IDF Chief of Staff.”

So, everybody wins: Lapid gets to show his few remaining potential voters that he’s tough on parasitic Haredim; the Haredi yeshiva deans get to show the world that Israel hates Torah; and Yeshiva students and their families get a rare opportunity to drop their nasty habit of eating several times a day and living in homes.

Israel’s VIP Protection Unit has warned Israeli government ministers that they should not travel on Road 443 due to escalating terror attacks. Those attacks include stones, firebombs, and a roadside bomb that was neutralized before it could explode, according to a report on Israel Army Radio this morning.

Road 443 is the second main highway connecting Jerusalem, Israel’s capital to Tel Aviv, Israel’s financial center.

When the Supreme Court ordered, just over 3 years ago, that parts of Road 443 be reopened to traffic by Palestinian Authority citizens, the more grounded Israelis warned that the road would return to being the terror zone it was before it was closed off to PA traffic and terrorism.

Before Road 443 was closed, six Israelis had been killed and more injured by Palestinian Authority Arab attacks on Jews travelling on the road.

Those on the left claimed that these Israelis were being paranoid and exaggerating (remember the warning about rockets on Israel from Gaza, before the disengagement).

It wasn’t long after Road 443 was reopened that the stone throwing attacks began again and escalated to the level it is now.

It raises the obvious question, since we know what prevents these terror attacks on Road 443, why are Israeli ministers being warned from traveling on the road, instead of the government resolving the terror problem the way it knows that works.

In a last ditch attempt to block the granting of university status to Ariel College, some Israeli universities turned to the Supreme Court to block the decision.

Three Supreme Court judges, including the court president ruled against the petition, stating that the process was done properly, confirming Ariel’s new upgraded status.

For a country that promotes higher education, surprisingly, Ariel is its first new university in decades.

Or not so surprising, as among other things, universities receive additional government funding, causing the existing universities to be concerned about the slicing of their pie, thus blocking new entries into the market.

For some of the universities, their opposition was also political, as Ariel University is located in post-67 Israel.

Unlike in the US, in Israel, universities are considered to be more prestigious than colleges, and only universities can offer a doctorate degree.