Dear friends and supporters,
Greetings from the Adalah team.
In this report, we update you about key legal actions undertaken by Adalah to respond to the needs of Palestinians in Israel and in the Occupied Palestinian Territory in order to protect their rights, and recent decisions by Israeli authorities on Adalah's cases.
We bring you examples of our work in three fields: Economic and Social Rights, Land and Planning Rights, and Civil and Political Rights.
Economic and social rights: Returning a Fishing Boat to its Owners in Gaza
On 14 July 2023, Israel was forced to return a fishing boat to its owners in the Gaza Strip following a motion for an interim order filed by Gisha – Legal Center for Freedom of Movement and Adalah to the Haifa District Court sitting as the Maritime Court. The boat was seized by the Israeli navy off Gaza’s coast in late 2022. Gisha and Adalah are representing the boat owners in a principled legal battle against Israel’s illegitimate request to confiscate the boat permanently. The Haifa Maritime Court ordered Israel to return the boat to Gaza “pending the resolution of legal proceedings.”
It is the second boat seized by the navy that the state of Israel has requested to confiscate permanently. On 18 September 2022, Israel was forced to release another fishing boat back to Gaza following a request to the court by Gisha and Adalah. The organizations’ principled legal battle against the state’s attempt to permanently confiscate fishing boats it seizes in Gaza’s sea space, which it will use to punish those who are deemed to ‘violate’ its restrictions and deprive them of their livelihoods, continues.
The seizure of the boats for extended periods has caused grave harm to the livelihoods and food security of several Palestinian families in Gaza. The arbitrary restrictions Israel enforces in Gaza’s “fishing zone” already reduce local fishermen’s possibility of providing for their families and living in dignity. Additionally, the violence used by Israel to enforce its restrictions often results in injury, and sometimes death.
Read more about the cases:
Israel forced to return a fishing boat to its owners in Gaza “pending resolution of the case”, 17 July 2023
Following action by Gisha & Adalah, Israel forced to return fishing boat to Gaza owner, 18 September 2022
Land and Planning Rights: Challenging Railway Land-Grab
In July 2022, Adalah and Bimkom - Planners for Planning Rights filed an objection to the Northern District Planning and Building Committee against a railway plan that will confiscate 1400 dunams of agricultural land in the Arab town of Muqeible in the north of Israel (also known as the ‘Afula-Jenin railway’). Adalah argued that the plan will undermine Muqeible’s future development, the health and safety of its residents and their land.
In late 2022, the Minister of Transport instructed the relevant authorities to review two alternative plans for the railway that were proposed by Adalah and Bimkom, and after the Committee held a hearing in the case in December 2022, it ordered the Israel Railways (a state-owned company) to examine the option of moving the railway farther from Muqeible. On 27 July 2023, the Committee approved the plan and rejected all objections filed against it. However, it accepted the Israel Railways' proposed concession to reduce the plan's area by approximately 100 dunams near Muqeible, aiming to mitigate the harmful impact on the town. The Committee also ordered the construction of a noise barrier and emphasized that landowners from Muqeible are entitled to compensation, as a matter of law.
Civil and Political Rights: Objecting to Proposed Bill Authorizing National Security Minister to Order Administrative Detentions
The Israeli government has lost no time in proposing and promoting laws and implementing policies that violate Palestinians' rights. In July 2023, Adalah sent a letter to the Attorney General and the Ministerial Committee for Legislation, objecting to a private member’s bill (which since was passed into a law) that would authorize Ben-Gvir, the National Security Minister, and other law enforcement entities to issue administrative detention orders, an authority held only by the Minister of Defense. It would also allow them to impose restrictions on leaving the country, on internet use, employment, movement and place of residence; and prohibitions on contact with specific individuals, similar to the 1945 Emergency Defense Regulations.
According to the bill’s explanatory notes, its necessity is due to the “significant increase in severe crime and a drastic rise in murder incidents, especially within Arab society, which also affects innocent civilians”. Adalah argued that these extensive powers undermine a broad range of human rights; that the underlying intention of the bill is to target Palestinian citizens of Israel and to reintroduce tools used against them during the military regime period (1948-1966); and that this bill have been put forward under the false pretext of "fighting crime in Arab society".
Thank you for your continued support.
Ranna Khalil
Dear Friends,
Many greetings from Adalah.
During the past month, Adalah achieved important successes on behalf of Palestinian citizens of Israel in the fields of economic & social rights and civil & political rights, despite the ongoing discriminatory practices and the formidable obstacles posed by the new ultra-right-wing Israeli government advancing racist policies and laws, particularly against Palestinians.
Among Adalah's recent major successes:
Ensuring the provision of a state funded Psychometric preparation course in Arabic
Following Adalah's years-long legal intervention, in March 2023, the Israel National Digital Agency – a project led by the Ministry of Economy and Industry – announced that it had begun providing a free online preparatory course for the national Psychometric exam in Arabic, after it was previously offered only in Hebrew.
The preparatory online course for the Psychometric exam, which determines students’ higher education eligibility, has been offered to students since January 2019. Until now, the online course was available only in Hebrew, thereby discriminating against students who take the exam in Arabic. Approximately one-third of all students in Israel take the Psychometric examination in Arabic, and this figure has been steadily increasing over the past decade, although there remains a consistent significant gap in the average scores between Arabic and Hebrew tests. For example, in 2021 the average Hebrew-language score was 579, while the average Arabic-language score was 495 (out of a maximum score of 700).
Since December 2018, Adalah has launched a series of legal actions demanding that the state allocate funds also for a Psychometric prep course in Arabic in advance of the Arabic exams. In the letters, Adalah stressed that offering the course only in Hebrew will cause serious harm to Palestinian students, will perpetuate existing education gaps, and will make it more difficult for Palestinian students to integrate into academia and, later, into the workforce.
As the majority of potential higher education students, both Palestinian and Jewish students, undergo preparatory courses for the exam, offering a free preparatory course only in Hebrew constitutes a discrimination on the basis of nationality. A report by the National Institute for Testing and Evaluation (the body in charge of the Psychometric exam) reveals a direct correlation between the economic and social situation of the test takers and their final mark. Israel's decades long discriminatory policies in budget allocations has contributed to worsening the economic situation – and consequently, the educational attainment – of Palestinian citizens of Israel.
This newly announced free course is a step toward closing the gaps in academia between Palestinian and Jewish students and allows Palestinian students the opportunity to prepare for the Psychometric exam with fewer financial constraints.
Tel Aviv University lifts ban on a book fair organized by Palestinian student movement on campus
On 19 March 2023, Adalah appealed a decision by Tel Aviv University to prevent Jafra (a Palestinian student movement on campus) from holding their annual book fair on campus. The university administration conditioned holding the book fair on campus on Jafra obtaining a permit from the police for the event and not including books that could potentially "incite against the state of Israel". In the appeal, Adalah argued that the university’s decision constituted a violation of cultural freedoms and freedom of expression and imposed illegal censorship on student activity at the university.
Adalah also appealed a decision by the university to ban an event by another Palestinian student movement – Jabha – protesting against Israeli authorities’ ban on the raising of the Palestinian flag in public spaces, as Jabha had planned to paint the Palestinian flag on campus during an upcoming event.
As argued in the appeals, these decisions violate the regulations and the constitution of Tel Aviv University, which call on allowing freedom of protest against the judicial overhaul that the new government is advancing. Despite these regulations, the university conversely imposed censorship on books, following in the footsteps of dark regimes in history that prevented the sale and distribution of books and cultural content. In addition, the administration violated students’ right to protest and political expression by preventing them from holding events protesting against racist governmental laws and policies. The university, which should provide a space for the free exchange of ideas and opinions, infringed on the academic rights of Palestinian students by silencing them.
After the university initially rejected Adalah’s appeal to hold the book fair, Adalah sent a follow-up letter demanding the administration to reconsider its decision, following which, on 18 April 2023, the university administration informed Jafra that they will allow them to hold the book fair on campus.
Releasing a Palestinian protestor from house arrest
S.T, a Palestinian citizen of Israel, was arrested on 5 April 2023 for raising the Palestinian flag during a protest in the northern city of Haifa against Israeli attacks targeting Palestinian worshippers in Al-Aqsa Mosque in East Jerusalem. The following day, the Haifa district court approved the police’s request to release S.T under a six-day house arrest.
Adalah, with private attorney R.N, filed an urgent appeal against the court’s decision to confine her to house arrest at her parents’ house in a town outside of Haifa. Adalah and R.N argued that the restrictions imposed on S.T would disproportionately harm her freedom of movement and freedom to pursue her occupation.
The District Court accepted Adalah and R.N’s appeal, ordering the immediate release of S.T without any restrictive conditions.
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Adalah will continue to challenge discriminatory and racist policies targeting Palestinian citizens of Israel.
Thank you for your continued support for Adalah’s work. We sincerely appreciate it.
Dear Friends and Supporters,
Adalah’s team wishes you and your families a happy, healthy holiday and New Year. We thank you for your steadfast support for Adalah in 2022, and ask that you continue to stand with us as we confront mounting challenges in the coming year.
Throughout 2022, the current ‘change’ government engaged in serious human rights violations, including the bogus designation of six leading Palestinian human rights and civil organizations as ‘terror organizations’; approving 4,000 new housing units in the illegal settlements in the West Bank; and engaging in nightly raids in the West Bank that resulted in the highest annual tally of Palestinians killed over the past seven years.
However, despite these formidable obstacles and the deteriorating political situation, Adalah was able to obtain significant achievements for Palestinians in Israel and in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT).
Positive outcomes that we achieved through our legal work, international advocacy initiatives and media outreach included re-activating the Food Security Council and ensuring Arab representation on this crucial body; defending Bedouin residents of Ras Jrabah village in the Naqab (Negev) in court against the state’s attempts to evacuate and dispossess them; enabling Palestinians in East Jerusalem and Syrian residents of the Golan Heights to apply for higher education scholarships from the Israeli lottery; securing the removal of all ten police checkpoints erected in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood of East Jerusalem during protests against home demolitions; and representing Arab political parties against attempts by right-wing actors to disqualify them from Knesset elections. We are extremely proud of these results as we contemplate the year that is drawing to an end, and look ahead to 2023.
The fight before us will be largely shaped by the results of the Knesset elections held in November 2022, which delivered a comfortable victory to the exclusively radical right-wing and Ultra-Orthodox coalition. The ruling coalition includes virulently racist parties, some leaders of which are affiliated with the former Kach Party, declared a terror organization by Israel in the 1980s, or have been criminally convicted for incitement to violence against Palestinians. Such a government stands alongside some of the darkest regimes in history.
Click Here to view a slideshow of Highlights of Adalah's work in 2022
Other items on the coalition’s agenda are, alarmingly, relaxing the open-fire regulations of the Israeli police and armed forces, along with expanded powers and even greater impunity; the imposition of yet more restrictions based on Jewish religious law on the entire population; and limiting women’s and LGBTQ+ rights.
The coalition also seeks to promote plans to alter the Israeli legal system and weaken the powers of the judiciary, by rendering Knesset legislation immune from judicial review through a Knesset override law, for example, and by introducing a highly-politicized judicial selection process. At the same time, it plans to bolster the powers of the government and the Knesset, at the expense of the principle of the separation of powers.
The incoming government is planning to make moves against Palestinian citizens of Israel, which could include evacuating the remaining unrecognized Bedouin villages in the Naqab and ending Bedouin land disputes in favor of the state; expanding the use of ‘breach of loyalty’ as grounds for revoking citizenship; employing the Jewish Nation-State Law more broadly to discriminate against Palestinian citizens in state services and budgeting; and further militarizing policing in Arab towns and villages and in the mixed cities.
The advent of the new government presents grave dangers to both Palestinian and Israeli societies, including civil society organizations and human rights defenders, who are already embattled in the aftermath of the outlawing of the ‘Palestinian 6’ as ‘terror organizations’. In November 2022, religious Zionist leader and incumbent Finance Minister labelled human rights organizations an “existential threat to the State of Israel” and threatened that the government would target their sources of income through “legal and security means”.
Today, the involvement of the international community is clearly critical. It is imperative that we stand together against these threats.
Please consider making an end-of-year donation or a monthly recurring gift to Adalah, to allow us to continue to fight for the rights of Palestinians on both sides of the Green Line.
The Adalah Team
Links:
Dear friends,
Warm regards to you from Adalah.
In this report, we update you about Adalah's recent work and Israeli Supreme Court decisions in the following cases: Granting sweeping impunity to the Israeli army and police; Land Grab in Jerusalem; and Revocation of citizenship for "breach of loyalty".
GRANTING SWEEPING IMPUNITY TO THE ISRAELI ARMY AND POLICE
Israeli Supreme Court rules no redress, no remedies for Gaza victims
In early August, Israel launched an intensive air offensive on the Gaza Strip, killing 47 Palestinians, including 16 children, and injuring 360 more (Palestinian Ministry of Health figures, 7 August 2022). This recent killing and injuring of civilians in Gaza is a result of the Israeli authorities’ shielding of their armed forces from accountability measures for their actions, both criminal and civil. On 5 July 2022, the Israeli Supreme Court (SC) rejected an appeal filed by Adalah and Al-Mezan demanding civil tort compensation for a Palestinian family following the severe injury of their 15-year-old son, who was left in a wheel chair for life after he was shot by the Israeli military in 2014, outside of any “act of war”.
In this case, Adalah and Al Mezan challenged the 2012 amendment to Israel's Civil Wrongs Law (State Responsibility)-1952, which prescribes that residents of an “enemy territory” are not eligible for compensation from Israel. Israel declared Gaza to be “enemy territory” in 2007, following the takeover by Hamas. The law grants total, sweeping immunity for Israel from all liability for any damages, in violation of Israeli and international law. In its decision, while the SC acknowledged that the law infringes on fundamental rights of Gaza residents, it maintained that immunity is appropriate in order “to prevent economic and moral assistance to the enemy.”
Adalah and Al Mezan: “This decision not only grants sweeping immunity to the Israeli military to injure Palestinians wherever they are, but also determines, in a radical move, that the deliberate denial of compensation is an appropriate tool for harming the enemy. There is no clearer evidence of the fact that the Israeli legal system is committed to the legitimization of war crimes and to assisting the military in its efforts, by denying all legal remedies to victims, especially when, at the same time, the Court refuses to intervene in the state’s closure of criminal investigations into alleged war crimes and thus also providing impunity for criminal actions committed by the Israeli military."
The NGOs will demand a second hearing by an expanded panel of the SC on the case.
Demanding police accountability for the killing of a Palestinian citizen of Israel
Following a TV interview with a high official, Adalah sent a letter on 26 July 2022 to the Attorney General, the State Attorney (SA), and the Chief of the Police Investigation Department (PID) demanding to re-open an investigation into the 2017 police killing of Y.Q., a Palestinian citizen of Israel, during a home demolition operation in his village of Umm al-Hiran in the Naqab (Negev). In the interview, the former Deputy Chief of PID, M.S., revealed that the former SA and former chief of police pressured the PID to close the probe.
In the letter, Adalah argued that the statements by M.S. supported our deep suspicions of a conflict of interest within the SA’s Office that led to this unreasonable decision. In the interview, M.S. spoke of extreme pressure by public figures, coupled with a flawed investigation during which key evidence was ignored. The police killing of Y.Q. is yet another stark example of the lack accountability and the impunity granted to Israeli police forces in the killing of Palestinian citizens of Israel.
LAND GRAB IN JERUSALEM
US Embassy in Jerusalem to be built on privately-owned Palestinian land
In 2019, the US relocated its embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, choosing a temporary site before moving to its permanent location. Documents recently obtained by Adalah from the Israeli state archive reveal that the planned site of the new US Embassy compound will be located on privately-owned Palestinian land, which was illegally seized by the state pursuant to 1950 Israeli Absentees’ Property Law. The Plan, currently in the advanced stages of the approval process, was submitted in 2021 by the US State Department and the Israeli Land Authority to the Israeli planning authorities. The descendants of the Palestinian landowners, including residents of Jerusalem and US citizens, demand that Israel release their properties and that the US Administration cancel the plan.
Adalah’s Legal Director: "This plan is a serious escalation in the US legitimization of the illegal Israeli seizure of Palestinian land using the 1950 Absentees’ Property Law. Under this law, Israel dispossessed Palestinian refugees, internally displaced Palestinian citizens of Israel, and residents of illegally annexed East Jerusalem from their property in the years following the Nakba in 1948 and again in 1967. This legislation is an arbitrary, racially-based, discriminatory, and sweeping law for land confiscation with far-reaching implications. The US Embassy plan will violate the private property rights of Palestinian landowners, and the internationally-established right of Palestinian refugees to return and gain restitution of their properties."
In response to a media inquiry, the US State Department stated that it was now “engaged in a process that will culminate in [the] construction of a new embassy in Jerusalem", and that “The site of that new embassy has not yet been confirmed.”
The plan and the newly discovered evidence, which was revealed by Adalah on 10 July 2022 during Biden's visit in Israel, made headlines in local and international media, receiving wide coverage, including feature stories in the New York Times, NBC News, Democracy Now, and Haaretz.
R.K., a US citizen and a descendant of Palestinian landowners of this property, told Democracy Now: “The fact that the US government is now participating actively with the Israeli government in this project means that it is actively infringing on the property rights of the legitimate owners of these properties, including many US citizens… By putting the US Embassy in Jerusalem, the US is violating resolutions of the UN that it voted for: for Jerusalem to be an international city and for nothing to be done in Jerusalem that would jeopardize the final status of that city… We are demanding that the US not build an embassy on our land. This is our property. It’s not the property of the state of Israel to give or rent or lease to the US."
NO CITIZENSHIP WITHOUT LOYALTY
The Israeli Supreme Court upholds a dangerous law, which permits the revocation of citizenship for "breach of loyalty"
On 21 July 2022, the Israeli Supreme Court (SC) rejected a 2017 lower court decision to strip A. Z., a Palestinian citizen of Israel, of his citizenship, but upheld a 2008 law that allows for the Interior Minister to revoke the citizenship of individuals convicted of offenses that constitute a "breach of loyalty" against the State of Israel, even if the person becomes stateless. Adalah and the Association for Civil Rights in Israel (ACRI) represented A.Z. in this case.
Criminal offenses that constitute a "breach of loyalty" include an act of terrorism; an act of treason or serious espionage; or the acquisition of citizenship or the right of permanent residency in a hostile state or in hostile territory.
Since the law’s enactment, the Interior Minister has applied it selectively, only to Palestinian citizens of Israel. In the 31 cases considered for the revocation of citizenship, no request was ever made to strip a Jewish-Israeli citizen of citizenship, despite a number of extremely serious incidents in which Jewish citizens murdered Palestinians or other Jewish citizens. This fact shows a racist and discriminatory pattern that exclusively singles out Palestinian citizens based on their national belonging.
Read in the link below: Adalah’s Q&A on the Supreme Court judgment and its implications.
Read more in Adalah’s newsletter, 16 August 2022: War Crimes in Gaza & Strategic Litigation
Read Adalah's 2021 annual report to learn more about our work.
Thank you, as always, for your continued support for Adalah’s work.We sincerely appreciate it.
In solidarity,
Ranna Khalil
Links:
Dear friends,
Many greetings to you from Adalah.
In this update we highlight three new strategic litigation cases undertaken by Adalah. In these cases, Adalah challenged racist and discriminatory laws, policies and procedures before Israeli courts, as follows:
A law banning Palestinian family unification in Israel;
A procedure for appointing teachers in Arab special needs and other schools;
A demand to open employment bureaus in poverty-stricken Palestinian Bedouin towns in the Naqab
BAN ON PALESTINIAN FAMILY UNIFICATION
The newly-legislated Citizenship and Entry into Israel Law (Temporary Order) – 2022 – a new version of the 2003 Law – continues to prohibit the granting of legal status in Israel to Palestinians from the OPT or Israeli-defined “enemy states”, who are married to Palestinian citizens of Israel or residents of Jerusalem. For the first time, the Law explicitly states that it is intended to ensure a Jewish demographic majority.
Adalah petitioned the Israeli Supreme Court in March 2022, on behalf of three Palestinian families against the law, demanding that it be revoked. Adalah argued that it is a racist and discriminatory law that violates the right to establish a family, and allows the state to operate on two separate citizenship tracks based on national and ethnic affiliation under the eternal pretext of temporality.
WHO DECIDES ABOUT TEACHERS' APPOINTMENTS IN ARAB SCHOOLS
For decades, the Israeli Education Ministry has employed two separate tracks for appointing teachers: in Jewish schools, the principals have complete discretion for selecting teachers, while in Arab schools, selection is based on a scoring system and principals have no discretion. In February 2022, Adalah filed a petition to the Jerusalem District Court on behalf of Jusour- Bridges for Autism and the Chair of the Parents' Committee in Amar School in Haifa, Ms. Hanin Shomli, seeking to exclude Arab special education schools from this discriminatory procedure.
Dr. Kareem Nasser, an occupational therapist specializing in the education of autistic children, who gave an expert opinion in the case: ”The appointment procedure in Arab schools leads to the prioritization of teachers whose qualifications do not meet students’ needs, resulting in many Arab parents choosing to enroll their children in Jewish special education institutions. Those children are prevented from receiving education in their native language based on their own cultural values and traditions, thus impeding their developmental skills and preventing them from realizing their right to becoming equal and active members of society, achieving independence and full integration in family and community life.”
LACK OF EMPLOYMENT BUREAUS IN NAQAB BEDOUIN TOWNS
Despite having the highest unemployment and poverty rates in the country and the lowest socio-economic ranking, six Bedouin towns in the Naqab have no state-run employment centers; rather, job-seekers from these towns, as well as from nearby Bedouin villages, including the unrecognized villages, are directed to fairly distant Israeli Jewish cities. There is little to no public transport from these towns to the cities, and the existing centers are linguistically and culturally foreign. Employment centers provide unemployment benefits and offer job opportunities and vocational training for job seekers and assist employers in finding employees.
Adalah petitioned the Israeli Supreme Court in March 2022, on behalf of the local councils of four Bedouin villages, the Negev Coexistence Forum for Civil Equality and the Sidra Association, demanding the establishment of employment centers in Hura, Kuseife, Leqiya, A’ra’ara, Shqieb A-Salam (Segev Shalom), and Tal A-Sabei (Tel Sheva); Rahat is the only Bedouin town in Naqab which has a center. The high unemployment rates of Bedouins and the wide gaps, in general, between Palestinian Arab and Jewish citizens of Israel, are the result of, and have been maintained by, decades-long discriminatory state policies.
Click here to see Adalah’s News, 29 April 2022: Strategic Litigation
Thank you for your continued support of Adalah’s work.
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