Category: Press Releases

AL-HAQ: JOINT OPEN LETTER

26 November 2007

Joint Letter to Negotiating Parties by Palestinian Civil Society Organisations*

As Palestinian human rights and civil society organisations, we the undersigned, are deeply concerned by the lack of a clearly articulated legal framework for the upcoming diplomatic negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) to be held at Annapolis on 27 November. While the process of negotiation is inherently political, the legitimate demands of the Palestinian people to dignity, territorial sovereignty and self-determination as enshrined in binding international law may not be made the subjects of negotiation.

Following 40 years of occupation of the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip, and numerous rounds of failed diplomatic initiatives, international law must at last be understood to be the essential over-arching framework for negotiations. International law not only provides a means of dispassionately assessing Israel’s existing policies and practices in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT), but also limits the discretion of the negotiating parties, and their sponsors, in deciding certain fundamental issues. Under the terms of Article 4 of the Fourth Geneva Convention Relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War of 1949 (the Fourth Geneva Convention), the Palestinian civilian population of the OPT are “protected persons.” By virtue of this status, they are entitled to certain protections that may not be undermined or disregarded in political agreements. This is clearly set forth in Article 47 of the Fourth Geneva Convention, which establishes:

Protected persons who are in occupied territory shall not be deprived, in any case or in any manner whatsoever, of the benefits of the present Convention by any change introduced, as the result of the occupation of a territory, into the institutions or government of the said territory, nor by any agreement concluded between the authorities of the occupied territories and the Occupying Power, nor by any annexation by the latter of the whole or part of the occupied territory.

This provision seeks to address the obvious imbalance of power between the occupied and the occupier in any negotiation process. It recognises that an Occupying Power can, by virtue of its occupation, seek to legally validate through “negotiation” the unilateral imposition of facts on the ground that violate international humanitarian law and harm the civilian population. As noted by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) in its authoritative commentary to the Fourth Geneva Convention, there is in the case of occupation, “a particularly great danger of the Occupying Power forcing the Power whose territory is occupied to conclude agreements prejudicial to protected persons.” This danger is clearly present in the context of the current negotiations, and is most obvious in relation to Israel’s settlement policy.

Throughout the 40 years of the occupation, Israel has used its effective control over the OPT to implant some 149 settlements, currently home to over 470,000 settlers, which control over 40% of the West Bank, including essential agricultural and water resources. The current planned route of the Wall will incorporate some 69 settlements, home to 83% of the settler population, on 12.8% of the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, that will remain on the western side of the Wall. Under Article 49(6) of the Fourth Geneva Convention, an Occupying Power is prohibited from transferring parts of its civilian population into occupied territory. Israeli settlements in the OPT are in flagrant violation of this prohibition. Further, the construction and expansion of settlements, and their associated infrastructure, requires the extensive appropriation and destruction of property, and severe movement restrictions which are further violations of international humanitarian law and human rights law.

In March 2006 Israel’s Prime Minister Ehud Olmert stated his intention to make the Wall the new border of the State of Israel, incorporating settlements in the OPT and annexing Palestinian land. To accept Israel’s retention of the settlement blocs as part of a negotiated solution clearly deprives the Palestinian civilian population of the benefits of the Fourth Geneva Convention, as it would validate Israel’s violations thereof. As such any agreement recognising the settlements is in flagrant violation of Article 47.

In the event that negotiations were to lead to recognition of Israeli settlements in the OPT as part of the State of Israel, this would amount to the endorsement of the acquisition of territory by force. The illegality of the acquisition of territory by force is a norm accepted and recognised by the international community as a peremptory norm of international law — a norm from which no derogation is permitted.

The right of all peoples to self-determination is also considered a peremptory norm of international law. The retention of settlements and their associated infrastructure by Israel would not only amount to the illegal annexation of territory, but would also fragment the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, into isolated geographical units. This would severely undermine the meaningful exercise by the Palestinian people of their inalienable right to self-determination by limiting the possibility of a contiguous territory and the ability to freely dispose of natural resources, both of which are required for the meaningful exercise of this right.

Under Article 53 of the Vienna Convention on the Laws of Treaties, “a treaty is void if, at the time of its conclusion, it conflicts with a peremptory norm of general international law.” This therefore casts severe doubt on whether a negotiated solution that accepts Israel’s retention of settlements and
de facto annexation of territory would be valid under international law.

Other State parties accessory to the negotiations are also obliged to duly consider their international law obligations in relation to these negotiations. Under common Article 1 of the Geneva Conventions, the High Contracting Parties “undertake to respect and to ensure respect for the present Convention in all circumstances.” As specified by both the ICRC and the International Court of Justice (ICJ), this provision entails an obligation on all State parties, whether or not they are a party to the specific conflict, to take all possible steps to ensure that the provisions of the Convention are respected. In respect of the current negotiations, it is important to note that the ICJ, in its Advisory Opinion on the Wall, found all States to be under “an obligation, while respecting the United Nations Charter and international law, to ensure compliance by Israel with international humanitarian law as embodied in [the Fourth Geneva] convention.” Similarly, and as also noted by the ICJ, under customary international law all States have the duty not to recognise or to assist in the creation or maintenance of illegal situations. Such illegal situations would clearly include the acquisition of territory by force, the denial of the right to self-determination and the construction of settlements in occupied territory.

To date, all diplomatic initiatives have ignored international law as the essential foundation of any solution to Israel’s occupation of the OPT, thereby allowing for the proliferation of violations. To cite but a few examples, in spite of former negotiations, Palestinians saw, inter alia, the imposition of draconian movement restrictions and unrestrained settlement construction and expansion, during the Oslo Process. Similarly, since the “Road Map” was initiated in 2002, Palestinians have seen the further entrenchment and expansion of settlements and the unilateral creation of a de facto border between Israel and the would-be Palestinian state through the building of the Wall.

Most recently, on 19 September 2007, Israel declared the Gaza Strip an “enemy entity,” and began the imposition of further sanctions on the already beleaguered Palestinian civilian population therein. Having no basis in international law, the designation of the Gaza Strip as an “enemy entity” represents a clear effort by the Israel, the Occupying Power, to negate its responsibility for the welfare of the civilian population of the Gaza Strip under the terms of Fourth Geneva Convention. The sanctions, which further exacerbate an already dire humanitarian situation, further amount to unlawful reprisals and the collective punishment of the civilian population of the Gaza Strip.

In this context, we urge the parties to approach the upcoming negotiations with a renewed sense of purpose, giving due recognition of the international legal obligations incumbent upon them, including UN Security Council and General Assembly resolutions addressing Palestinian refugees. The task which they face is a heavy one, as any final agreement must reflect a commitment to the principles of international law, justice in addressing wrongful acts, and respect for human rights. The fundamental rights of the Palestinian people are matters of binding international law, not political bargaining chips. Their implementation must not be left to Israel’s beneficence, but rather established as the foundation of any just and durable solution to the conflict.

Al-Haq

Al-Dameer Association for Human Rights in Gaza

Addameer Prisoner’s Support and Human Rights Association

Al Mezan Center for Human Rights

Defence for Children International – Palestine Section

Jerusalem Legal Aid and Human Rights Center

Palestinian Center for Human Rights

Palestinian Counselling Center

Palestinian NGO Network (PNGO)

Ramallah Center for Human Rights Studies

Women’s Studies Center

For Immediate Release

There will be a large non-violent demonstration tomorrow at 3.30pm against Huwwara checkpoint, just south of the West Bank city of Nablus. Palestinians, joined by internationals, will deliver a message to the Israeli army: We have had enough of the seven years of curfew that have been imposed on Nablus.

Huwwara checkpoint, along with 7 other checkpoints, make up a closure regime completely surrounding Nablus. Unmarried males between the ages of 16 and 35 are not allowed to leave the city without special permission. Only 10% of busses, 7% of taxis and fifty individual cars are allowed to leave (OCHAOPT).

The checkpoints are also routinely closed, and when open the queues can be incredibly long. Even during winter, or the peak of summer, people can be stranded in the elements for hours. Many people have even died at the checkpoints as a result of delays in receiving medical attention. The most recent case was Taysir Mahmoud Ibrahim Qaysi, a cancer patient who was in a car without a permit, and was not allowed through Huwwara checkpoint. He died while waiting for car with a permit to get to him.

The lack of free movement of people and goods has had a devastating effect on the local economy. Unemployment rose 45% from 1999 to 2006 (PCBS) and continues to rise sharply, especially in the refugee camps within Nablus.

This isolation is not unique to Nablus, but is found throughout the West Bank. The system of closures, Israeli only roads and the wall serve to split the West Bank into isolated enclaves. Traveling between the enclaves can be difficult or impossible. There are 561 (OCHAOPT) closures in the West Bank, only 14 of these fall on the green line. Security cannot justify 547 closures within Palestinian territory. As with Nablus, the closures have had a massive impact on the Palestinian economy as people find it increasingly difficult to get to work: unemployment is now well above 40%. The closures collectively punish 2.5 million ordinary Palestinians for the actions of a few combatants, and serve no extra security function.

You can meet the demonstration either at 3pm in the Tanweer centre near Aduara, or at 3.30pm at Huwwara checkpoint.

For more information:

Wael (Arabic) – 059 9360741
John (English) – 054 5364072

For Immediate Release

Tomorrow 36 members of the French Parliament and regional mayors will join the people of Bil’in for their weekly protest against the apartheid wall and settlements. Palestinian, Israeli and international protestors will meet at 12pm by the mosque in Bil’in village to march to a site near the Modi’in Illit settlement.

The popular committee of Bil’in have been organizing weekly protests for almost three years now, culminating in an Israeli supreme court decision to reroute the apartheid wall further west to give Bilin 250 acres of its land back.

However, the protest continues as the supreme court also rejected a petition to stop the construction of another Israeli settlement, Mattiyahu East, on Bil’ins land even further to the west. Israel, with US support, appears determined to retain major West Bank settlement blocs, including one west of Bil’in, that carve the West Bank into bantustans.

The weekly protest started In December, 2004 when the Israeli army started bulldozing village land and uprooting olive trees to build the wall. Palestinians, Israelis and internationals suffered patiently together as the soldiers met the nonviolent actions with teargas, rubber-coated steel bullets, and clubs. Over 800 have activists have been injured in 200 demonstrations. An Israeli attorney and a Bil’in resident both suffered permanent brain damage from rubber-coated steel bullets shot from close range. Another Palestinian lost sight in one eye. 49 Bil’in residents, including some protest leaders have arrested, even had their houses raided by the army. Some people have spent months in prison.

Creative activities are a regular feature of the protests. One Friday, activists locked themselves inside a cage, representing the wall’s impacts. Another time, a Palestinian “outpost” was built on village land located behind the wall and next to an Israeli settlement, mimicking the Israeli strategy of establishing outposts to expand settlements.

Another Friday protestors handed the Israeli soldiers a letter saying, “Had you come here as guests, we would show you the trees that our grandfathers planted here, and the vegetables that we grow… There will never be security for any of us until Israelis respect our rights to this land.”

For More Information:

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Abdullah: 0547258210
Mohammed: 0545573285

The French group “Two Peoples, Two States” calls the public for signing a petition (based on a “Two States Solution”, on the outlines of the Yossi Beilin and Yasser Abbed Rabbo’s “Geneva Initiative”, and the Ami Ayalon and Sari Nusseibeh’s “The Peoples Voice”), which “acknowledge the equal legitimacy of both liberation struggle movements”, and which, in a suspicious way, fails to call for Israel’s full compliance with its obligations under international law through ending its illegal military occupation, its denial of Palestinian refugee rights, and its system of racial discrimination against its own Palestinian citizens.

The unfortunate and harmful support to this petition by religious, secular, political, union, antiracist organizations, among others, at Zionists organizations side, reveals either ignorance of the hidden agenda inherent in the whole initiative, deceptively camouflaged as a collective call for peace, or willingness to forfeit the inalienable rights of the Palestinian people in return for advancing selfish interests.

We ask the French audience and the supporters of a fair peace in Palestine not to be part of this public relations sham, which covers up a deceitful political agenda that falls significantly short of international law tenets and the Palestinian national program.

The “Two Peoples, Two States” group’s campaign poses many problems, among them, a lack of distinction between the occupier and the occupied, the implicit support to the maintenance of the Israelis settlement blocks, the obvious contempt to the right of return for the refugees, the non-mention to the Israeli illegal wall and the lack of any reference to the international law and/or to the human rights.

As the Oslo Agreements and the “Disengagement Plan from Gaza”, the peace process, currently mulled over, is an initiative aimed at enforcing the Israeli control on the whole historical Palestine, while allowing Israel to get rid of its responsibilities towards an important part of the Palestinian people.

The group “Two Peoples, Two States” quotes and upholds the fundamentals of the “Geneva Initiative” and “The Peoples Voice”:

“The State of Israel as Jewish People’s State, the State of Palestine as Palestinian People’s State, both derived from a legitimate national liberation movement, specifically:

the dismantling of most of the Jewish settlements in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, territories swaps agreed by both parties on the basis of the 1967 borders”.

Israel will maintain its major population centres in the West Bank; known as settlement blocs, which, according to Perez, represent no more than 5% of the West Bank, and it does not include Occupied Jerusalem, where there are 250.000 Israeli settlers living.

Israel proposes to the Palestinians a swap according to which it would give the same amount of land Israel populated by Palestinians who hold Israeli citizenship. This will allow Israel to remove some of its Arab population, which most Jewish Israelis perceive as “demographic threat” to the nature of the Jewish state.

“. a dignified and realistic solving of the Palestinians refugees issue governed by the respect of the Israeli sovereignty,”

In his letter sent to Sharon in 2004, Bush stated: ” It seems clear that an agreed, just, fair and realistic framework for a solution to the Palestinian refugee issue as part of any final status agreement will need to be found through the establishment of a Palestinian state, and the settling of Palestinian refugees there, rather than in Israel.”

Consequently, in the Israel’s offer, the right of return will be granted to the Palestinian refugees, not in their homes, but in some small parts non adjacent to their original homeland and divided in separated territorial units (walled up ghettos), without any opportunity to maintain a long-lasting economy and without any control on water, energy or on any other essential resources. They will be allowed to come back in a cage whose door will be controlled by Israel.

“. (…) and a partition of Jerusalem as capital for both States.”

According to several reports, ” There will be two capitals in Jerusalem, one for Israel and one for Palestine. The Israeli neighbourhoods will be under Israeli sovereignty and the Arab neighbourhoods under Palestinian sovereignty. There will be cooperation between both authorities which will allow for better administration of people’s lives. Special arrangements will be prepared to secure access to Holy places for all religions “
Therefore, on September 24, the Israeli military commander of the West Bank has issued an expropriation order for about 120 hectares of land located in the Jerusalem area, in order to build 3.500 new houses as part of Project E1 and in extension of the huge settlement Maale Adumin, where 30,000 Israeli settlers are already living, the Wall and a road for Palestinian use. Then the city of Jerusalem will be completely surrounded by Israeli settlements, and no Palestinian living in the West Bank will have access to it.

Furthermore, it is obvious that Israel is insisting on arrogating large parts of occupied East Jerusalem on the ground that Jewish neighborhoods go to Israel and Arab neighborhoods go to a “future” Palestinian state.

That would be disastrous for the Palestinian cause since it would entail the whitewashing of decades of theft of Palestinian property in Palestine’s holy capital, as there are not “mere neighborhoods.” These are illegal settlements built on confiscated Arab land for the sole purpose of obliterating East Jerusalem’s Arab (Muslim-Christian) identity.

We denounce and oppose to these efforts to violate the Palestinians’ human rights, and we assert that the only solution to the Israelo-Palestinian “conflict” should be based on the International Law and the Human Rights, references which do not appear in the call of the “Two Peoples, Two States”’s campaign.

We maintain that the new Israelis generous offer, a two-states solution promoted by G. Bush and C. Rice, will not actually establish two states, and must not be seen as a solution. It will only be the establishment of Apartheid, with the support of the international community.

We call for the 129 organizations and 7815 individuals that have already endorsed this petition, to withdraw their support to this movement that does not promote, at any time, the right of the Palestinian people to justice, equality and freedom.

We also ask those that have not been engaging yet in this call to help us in asking Israel to respect the international law and to put pressure on our governments, particularly the European Union as member of the Quartet, to implement their own decisions in order to apply the international humanitarian law (2005 / C 327/04), and the imposition of sanctions and restrictive measures.