Partners Joseph Benkel and Eli Cohen successfully represented clients of the firm in an appeal to the Supreme Court against a ruling of the Central District Court, which rejected their claim to order the Israel Land Authority to allocate them land in Moshav Kefar Sirkin.
In a precedent verdict, the Supreme Court has ruled that the authority may not refuse to enter into agreements with entrepreneurs, only due to the fact that they were late in paying the capitalization fee, inter alia, due to an error in the payment form issued by the authority, because even if there is a mistake, an examination of the authority good faith is required, especially where the authority insists on the execution of transactions in accordance with the dates that were set by it, when a deviation from these dates, even for a few days, may lead to the cancellation of the transaction by the authority.
The Supreme Court has ruled that the information the authority provides to entrepreneurs, regarding the deadlines they have to meet, must be as clear as possible, and every mistake or inaccuracy on the authority part, even if it was done by accident, are not consistent with the duty of fairness applied to it, and it could be considered as holding negotiation in bad faith on its part.
As a result, the Supreme Court ordered the Authority to enter into an agreement with the customers, while extending the deadline set for the payment of the capitalization fee.
