The presidents ofIsrael's eight universities petitioned the Supreme Court on Monday to overturn a decision to grant university status to an Israeli college located in the West Bank.

A copy of the petition, which was sent to Xinhua, argued that the decision to upgrade Ariel University Center of Samaria - located in the city of the same name - without conducting a basic check that it meets all academic standards and the potential effect on Israel's higher education system was "seriously flawed" and "totally unreasonable."

They further charged that adding another university would strike a "major blow" to the higher education system, and that there is no need in a Hebrew-speaking university in the West Bank as only 15 percent of its 12,500 students reside in Ariel or the vicinity.

"This decision came out of the blue," the petition states, " with complete disregard to the situation, and without having any sort of examination about the scientific needs of the State of Israel and the criteria for requested acknowledgement."

Many Israelis from both sides of the political divide are conflicted over Ariel, a mostly-secular city of 18,000. While some Israelis, including its leaders and government officials, contend that it would stay under Israeli sovereignty under any future peace accord, others maintain that it is an illegal settlement, and therefore, beyond the pale.

Last month, an 11-members majority within the Council for Higher Education in Judea and Samaria [a different body than the official Higher Education Committee, and subject to the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) in the West Bank] announced its decision to upgrade the center into a university.

The petition was filed by the presidents of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Tel Aviv University, Technion - Israel Institute of Technology, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Haifa University, the Weizmann Institute of Science, and the Open University of Israel against the Israeli government, the IDF, Education Minister Gideon Sa'ar, the Higher Education Council in Judea and Samaria, and Ariel college.

A spokesperson for the committee of university heads told Xinhua on Monday that their petition was not politically motivated.

They also noted that the subcommittee for planning and budgeting, which delivers the funds to academic institutions, opposed the upgrade in status and said that an "unauthorized body" with a conflict of interests made the decision.

"This decision, made by an unauthorized body which circumvented the decision made by the official Higher Council of Education and their views, is extremely problematic. There are problems with the authority, as well as the facility meeting academic and budgetary standards," Rivka Karmi, president of the Ben-Gurion University told Army Radio on Monday.

The universities further claimed that the decision seriously damaged their budgets and future plans of development, after a decade in which they suffered serious economic crises due to widespread cost-cutting.

Ariel's Eli Eylon, a member of the college's board of directors, said in reply that all decisions regarding the future of the facility would be administered "in accordance with the decisions made by the government."