For more information please CLICK HERE

GAZA: AN ISRAELI CALL FOR URGENT ACTION

noreply@blogger.com (Fred Schlomka) — Tue, 22 Jan 2008 06:28:00 +0000

We, the Israeli organizations signed below, deplore the decision by the Israeli government to cut off vital supplies of electricity and fuel (and therefore water, since the pumps cannot work), as well as essential foodstuffs, medicines and other humanitarian supplies to the civilian population of Gaza. Such an action constitutes a clear and unequivocal crime against humanity.
Prof. John Dugard, the UN Special Rapporteur for Human Rights in the Palestinian Territories, called the Israeli government’s actions “serious war crimes” for which its political and military officials should be prosecuted and punished. The killing of more than 40 civilians this past week violates, he said, “the strict prohibition on collective punishment contained in the Fourth Geneva Convention. It also violates one of the basic principles of international humanitarian law that military action must distinguish between military targets and civilian targets.” Indeed, the very legal framework invoked by the Israeli government to carry out this illegal and immoral act – declaring Gaza a “hostile entity” within a “conflict short of war” – has absolutely no standing in international law.
We call on the Secretary General of the UN, Mr. Ban Ki-Moon, to lead the Security Council to a decisive decision to end the siege on Gaza when it meets in emergency session on Wednesday.
We call on the governments of the world, and in particular the American government and the European Parliament, to censure Israel’s actions and, in light of recent attempts to revive the diplomatic process, to end all attacks on civilians, including the continuing demolition of Palestinian homes at an alarming rate.
We call upon the Jews of the world in whose name the Israeli government purports to speak, and upon their rabbis and communal leaders in particular, to speak out unequivocally against this offense to the very moral core of Jewish values.
And we call upon the peoples of the world to let their officials and leaders know of their repudiation of this cruel, illegal and immoral act – an act that stands out in its cruelty even in an already oppressive Israeli Occupation.
We condemns attacks on all civilians, and we acknowledge the suffering of the residents of Sderot. Still, those attacks do not justify the massive disproportionality of Israeli sanctions over a million and half civilians of Gaza, in particular in light of Israel’s oppressive 40 year occupation. Such violations of international law by a government are especially egregious and must be denounced and punished if the very system of human rights and international law is to be preserved.
The Israeli government’s decision to punish Gaza’s civilian population, with all the human suffering that entails, constitutes State Terrorism against innocent people. Only when Israeli policy-makers are held accountable for their actions and international law upheld will a just peace be possible in the Middle East.

The Alternative Information Center * Bat Tsafon * Gush Shalom * The Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions (ICAHD) * Physicians for Human Rights * Coalition of Women for Peace

Santa Clause AKA-Jeff Halper

noreply@blogger.com (Fred Schlomka) — Thu, 27 Dec 2007 12:56:00 +0000

ICAHD Coordinator Jeff Halper and Rabbis for Human Rights Director Arik Ascherman visited Jerusalem City Hall with a crew of activists and attempted to deliver some home demolition debris as a Christmas present for the Mayor. Here's what happened . . . .

Whose Road map

noreply@blogger.com (Fred Schlomka) — Fri, 09 Nov 2007 08:06:00 +0000

by Jeff Halper
First published in the Jerusalem Post - 7th November 2007

As did his pronouncements last August in Jericho, where Prime Minister Ehud Olmert indicated a willingness to withdraw from an area equivalent to 100% of the occupied territories, his latest declarations to the Saban Forum, in the presence of Condoleezza Rice and Tony Blair, sounded promising, even stirring. "Annapolis is a landmark," he said, "on the path to negotiations and of the genuine effort to achieve the realization of the vision of two nations: the State of Israel - the nation of the Jewish people; and the Palestinian state - the nation of the Palestinian people."

Moreover, he expressed the hope that the two-state solution would be achieved before US President George W. Bush's term ends in January 2009.

The speech sounded sincere, even impassioned. Olmert gave the impression that he was willing to confront all the difficulties - including the necessity of Israel fulfilling its part of the road map bargain. He stated firmly and clearly that Israel had now "partners for peace" in the Palestinian leadership. All the bases appeared to have been covered; the commitment of the Israeli government to the road map and a two-state solution beyond doubt.

SO WHAT is the problem? The missing piece, the crucial document that subverts any viable two-state solution, a factor in Israel's strategic considerations mentioned by Olmert as an aside only a few days ago, is Bush's letter of April, 2004, to then-prime minister Ariel Sharon. This little-noticed document fundamentally changed the parameters of what is to be discussed in any "peace process" and what Israel's obligations are under the road map. It is considered by the Israeli government as perhaps the most crucial element in its effort to retain the major settlement blocs and in that way foreclosing the possibility of a viable Palestinian state.

The essence of the Bush letter, which was subsequently ratified by the House of Representatives by a vote of 407-9 and by the Senate by 95-1, is the following passage: "In light of new realities on the ground, including already existing major Israeli populations centers, it is unrealistic to expect that the outcome of final status negotiations will be a full and complete return to the armistice lines of 1949."
In one seemingly innocuous sentence, President Bush fatally but knowingly undermined UN Resolution 242, the very basis of the two-state solution since 1967 and of his own road map initiative, by nullifying the requirement that Israel return to the Green Line (with agreed-upon adjustments) so that a viable Palestinian state might emerge.

Israel takes the American position - rejected by the other three members of the road map Quartet, the UN, Europe and Russia, but so what? - as agreement to its retaining its major settlement blocs. They are six or seven in number: the Jordan Valley, the Ariel bloc, the Modi'in bloc, the three blocs that make up "Greater Jerusalem" (Givat Ze'ev, Ma'aleh Adumim and the Etzion Bloc/Efrat), and perhaps a salient into Hebron.

When, then, Olmert speaks of "conforming to the road map," he speaks of withdrawal from all the occupied territory outside those settlement blocs, since the Bush letter de facto annexes them to Israel. The massive building of settlements and highways within these settlement blocs does not, therefore, constitute a breach in Israel's responsibility to end settlement construction in the first phase of the road map, since they are no longer parts of the occupied territory.
The area of the settlement blocs that Israel wishes to retain may not seem like much; between 10-20% of the West Bank, including "Greater Jerusalem." But they are crucial for a viable Palestinian state - and "viability" is a term of reference in the road map.

The settlement blocs of an Israeli "Greater Jerusalem" remove from the Palestinians the economic heart of their future state, since up to 40% of the Palestinian economy, according to the World Bank, revolves around tourism in Jerusalem. The other blocs carve the West Bank into three "cantons" (Sharon's term, since Olmert's Convergence Plan, which he never abandoned, is based on Sharon's Cantonization Plan). The Jordan Valley bloc ensures Israeli control of the border and of the Jordan River's water.

Indeed, while accepting the road map, Olmert has in mind a very different document than that of the UN, the Europeans, the Russians and the Palestinians themselves. Integral to Israel's version of the document are the "14 reservations" it appended, which effectively nullify the road map as a genuine path to peace.

Reservation # 5, for example, states that "The provisional state will have provisional borders and certain aspects of sovereignty, be fully demilitarized…, be without the authority to undertake defense alliances or military cooperation, and Israeli control over the entry and exit of all persons and cargo, as well as of its air space and electromagnetic spectrum."

IN THE end, the Palestinians may get 80-90% of the West Bank, but they do not get a viable state. They will have sterile swatches of territory whereas Israel retains control of the borders, movement of people and goods both within the Palestinian state and between it and the countries around, much of the country's arable land, almost all its water, the Palestinians' airspace and even control of their communications. The Palestinian state is deprived of a viable economy. Given that 60% of Palestinians are under the age of 18 and that mini-state must absorb hundreds of thousands of refugees, its prospects for being a viable, stable and truly independent state are nil given the unspoken parameters outlined in the Bush letter.

There will be a Palestinian state. Israel has an urgent demographic need to get the almost four million Palestinians of the occupied territories off its hands. It might even attempt to "swap" a couple hundred thousand Israeli Arab citizens of the Galilee Triangle under the pretense of giving the Palestinians more land. The crucial question is: will it be a viable state? If it's true that Olmert intends that Israel permanently retain the settlement blocs, an Israeli "greater" Jerusalem and effective control of the entire country to the Jordan River, then we will merely be substituting a sophisticated form of apartheid for occupation. The devil is in the details.

The writer is the coordinator of the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions.

Copyright 1995- 2007 The Jerusalem Post

Quoting Ariel Sharon

noreply@blogger.com (Fred Schlomka) — Wed, 24 Oct 2007 20:59:00 +0000

” We’ll make a pastrami sandwich of them. We’ll insert a strip of Jewish settlements in between the Palestinians, and then another strip of Jewish settlements right across the West Bank, so that in 25 years, neither the United Nations, nor the U.S.A, nobody, will be able to tear it apart.”

- Ariel Sharon to Winston S. Churchill III in 1973 .

Ongoing Palestinian Disposession

noreply@blogger.com (Fred Schlomka) — Sat, 13 Oct 2007 12:10:00 +0000

Last Friday's Haaretz newspaper in Israel had an interesting Op Ed by Danny Rubinstein who wrote in part:

" The deliberate settling of Jews in the heart of East Jerusalem's Arab neighborhoods is an unacceptable act of incitement. Thirty years ago Mohammed Said Burkan wanted to buy a house in the Jewish Quarter of the Old City and his request was denied. He turned to the High Court of Justice, and Justice Haim Cohen, who rejected his request, determined that there was no discrimination in the fact that the Jews would have a quarter of their own, as in the past. "Each quarter and its ethnic group," wrote the justice. After the state denied Burkan, why shouldn't the Arab neighborhoods remain Arab?

The settlers of Elad on the outskirts of the village of Silwan acquired mainly houses and land purchased at the time by Baron Rothschild. The same is being done by similar associations in East Jerusalem, which locate land and assets purchased before 1948 by Jews and demand ownership of them. The Arabs, on the other hand, cannot demand assets they owned in Jerusalem?s Katamon neighborhood, in Jaffa, in Haifa and all over Israel, because in the 1950s the Knesset passed a retroactive law that is far from being a credit to our law books, and that prevents Arabs from receiving their property."

And people in Israel wonder why we are considered a racist state! No other democracy has these types of laws on the books.

Unlike other laws that were designed to establish Israel’s ‘legal’ control over lands, the body of law referred to by Rubinstein focused on formulating a ‘legal’ definition for the people (mostly Arabs) who had left or been forced to flee from these lands. Specific laws in this category include:

* The Absentees’ Property Law,
* The Land Acquisition (Validation of Acts and Compensation) Law,
* Absentees’ Property (Eviction) Law,
* Absentees’ Property (Amendment No.3) (Release and Use of Endowment Property) Law,
* Absentees’ Property (Amendment No. 4) (Release and Use of Property of Evangelical Episcopal Church) Law,
* Absentees’ Property (Compensation) Law,

As a result, two million dunams were confiscated and given to a specially created Israeli government agency, the Custodian of Absentee Property, who later transferred the land to the development authority. In addition to dispossessing Palestinian Arabs who fled the war and were not allowed to return, this law created the novel citizenship category of "present absentees" (nifkadim nohahim), that is, Israeli Arabs who enjoyed all civil rights-including the right to vote in the Knesset elections-except one: the right to use and dispose of their property". About 30,000-35,000 Palestinians became "present absentees" - persons present at the time but considered absent. These people and their decendants today number about 150,000 souls, all citizens of Israel, who are still unable to exercise their property rights.

Demolition Surges - The Occupation Deepens

noreply@blogger.com (Fred Schlomka) — Fri, 05 Oct 2007 09:05:00 +0000

Israel is increasingly targeting Israeli Arab citizens for house demolitions. This year has seen a tremendous surge in house demolitions in the southern Negev Desert, targeting the Bedouin communities who live there in poverty, without government services to their ‘unrecognized villages’. Just a few weeks ago the entire village of Twail Abu Jarwal was demolished for the tenth time.

ICAHD’s response is to help them rebuild - yet again. This time we will be purchasing sturdy tents that can be quickly dismantled should the bulldozers return. Our Constructing Peace Campaign has built almost 50 homes in the West Bank and East Jerusalem this year, plus helped rebuild a Bedouin village of 25+ families. The 18,000 Homes Campaign (see right column) is disseminating information through viral marketing of the banner and web page (you can help). ICAHD Coordinator, Jeff Halper, is currently on a USA speaking tour and will reach thousands of people during October with the message. But is it all enough? The Occupation continues to deepen and strengthen. The ‘Security Barrier’ continues to be built and strengthened. Demolitions and other human rights violations continue unabated.

Are we merely like the anti-slavery activists who passed the torch to future generations to fulfill the mission, or can we effect change now, not tomorrow? If so, how? Keep in mind that despite all our efforts over the years, the Israeli Occupation machine rolls forward and has strengthened and consolidated its grip on the West bank while Gaza is now a giant prison. Do we have to wait until Apartheid is undisputed on the ground, or can we halt and reverse the process? If so, how?

Welcome to ICAHD's Discussion

noreply@blogger.com (Fred Schlomka) — Mon, 01 Oct 2007 08:23:00 +0000

The ICAHD blog has been a long time coming. Resistance and opposition to house demolitions is ICAHD’s core mission. Over the years we have developed strategies to confront the Israeli Government with its policies of dispossession and ethnic cleansing in the Occupied Territories and increasingly inside Israel. As ICAHD’s work has developed, thousands of supporters from around the world have helped us get the word out about Israel’s continuing house demolitions and other human rights violations. Many of you support us financially for which we are deeply grateful. Without your support our work would not be possible. So now we invite you to engage in conversation with each other. Posts on this blog will be designed to stimulate discussion and debate, and perhaps together we can formulate some new ideas and strategies to end the Occupation.

Constructing Peace Report - Summer 2007

noreply@blogger.com (Fred Schlomka) — Mon, 24 Sep 2007 21:06:00 +0000

While ICAHD: The Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions has been rebuilding Palestinian homes for ten years, the expansion of the organization's building program this year has been unprecedented. From the Negev Desert, Hebron, Jerusalem and villages north of Ramallah, ICAHD has employed dozens of Palestinians to rebuild homes destroyed by the Israeli government.

photo gallery • slideshow • video

Over the years thousands of people have contributed to ICAHD’s work, especially in funding the rebuilding of demolished Palestinian homes. This year the generosity of donors enabled us to establish a new rebuilding campaign and provided us with half a million dollars to rebuild homes. With additional funding, we hope to rebuild every home demolished during the next year, and to conduct an international educational campaign. This new project was a dramatic call to action for ICAHD and its supporters and came to be called the Constructing Peace Campaign.

A project partnership was formed between ICAHD and ICAHD-USA, an independent non-profit established in 2005, to conduct education and outreach in the United States, and to help raise funds for ICAHD’s projects in Israel. ICAHD-USA became the primary fiscal sponsor for the Constructing Peace Campaign. Contracts were signed with the stipulation that no homes were to be rebuilt that had been demolished as punishment for military or terror activities. Only homes demolished for lack of a building permit were to be rebuilt. ICAHD-UK has also provided ongoing support for the Campaign.

By the end of May 2007, funds began to arrive in Israel and the project was up and running with several staffers dedicated to its success. The first three months were a rollercoaster ride as ICAHD staff rose to the occasion and put in place new fiscal and management frameworks, hired a Project Liaison Officer, Palestinian Field Supervisors, engaged contractors, and initiated a family selection program. Homes have been built from Hebron to Jerusalem and beyond, and at the time of writing this report, 67 families have received new homes. ICAHD’s total homes rebuilt over the past ten years now stands at 101, a testament to the generosity of ICAHD’s supporters, the dedication of its staff, and the tenacity of its activists.

As ICAHD’s Chief Field Supervisor, Salim Shawamreh, likes to say, “This is the life. This is the way it should be”.

Construction Process

Many of the houses that ICAHD has built over the years have been homes of 100-150 sq. meters sq. ft.) accommodating families of 6-15 people. In order to spread the available funds of the Campaign between as many families as possible a decision was made to use as a baseline, a standard home of only 30 sq. meters (270 sq.ft.). The basic floor plan was for two bedrooms, a bathroom with shower, and a kitchen/living room. This basic house was constructed of concrete and cinder blocks, a sheet metal roof, stucco on the exterior walls, plaster on the interior, four or five windows, and one external steel door. The interiors have tile floors, wooden doors, surface-mounted electrical conduits, and full indoor plumbing. These basic homes were intended for families of up to six people. Larger homes were built for families of more than six people. The basic model home was built by ICAHD for an average construction cost of $8-10,000 each.

Many families opted to change the basic floor plan, making one room a bit larger, or moving the bathroom to change the configuration. The process allowed a certain amount of flexibility in order to help families personalize their new homes. Many are planning to add insulation to the roof and other enhancements. Keep in mind that for some families these homes are only a temporary solution to their tragedy, while a long-term solution for others. Most of the new houses were not built on the original foundations of the demolished home for several reasons. By building the new home (usually much smaller) adjacent to the demolished home the project saved money since the rubble and tangled metal ‘rebar’ of the destroyed home did not have to be removed and the new home, given its size, did not need substantial foundations. Also, it was hoped that the government might not notice the new homes since they have a much lower profile than the original houses. The families also retained the option of rebuilding their original homes on the original foundation at a later date, when it was safe, and their finances permitted. However this option was in the remote future for most families since their life savings were usually tied up in their demolished home.

Some families had available funds and opted to add their money to the Campaign’s contribution. Thus in some cases ICAHD only put in the foundation of a more substantial home, or paid for a solid concrete roof. Also, the three homes built during the summer camp of 2007 were more than 1002 meters each, drawing on organizational grants and camp participant contributions in addition to Campaign funds. In this way the Campaign funds were leveraged with additional monies.

During different phases of the Campaign the services of Palestinian Field Coordinators were utilized. They supervised the contractors, liaised with the families, and helped arrange the purchase of materials. All the coordinating field staff, contractors, tradesmen, laborers, and construction material suppliers were Palestinian. Thus the Campaign also helped the general economy of the West Bank as the wages paid to construction workers rippled through businesses where they do their family shopping.

Promoting the Campaign

Although construction of homes began in May 2007, the project was officially launched at a press conference on June 11th. Neighborhood residents, ICAHD activists and a large Press contingent gathered in the remnants of the historic Mughrabi Quarter in Jerusalem’s Old City. Most of the neighborhood had been destroyed on the night of June 11, 1967 when 135 Palestinian families, over 600 people, were roused from their beds in the middle of the night and witnessed their homes being demolished to create a plaza for Jewish prayer in front of the Western (Wailing) Wall. The site was chosen for the Campaign launch due to its symbolic value as the first home demolitions of the Occupation.

ICAHD activists, accompanied by Israeli, Palestinian and international press, were met in the Quarter’s sole remaining mosque by Mahmoud Masloukhi, the Mughrabi Quarter Mukhtar (civic leader), who spoke of the night 40 years ago when his home was demolished.

Jeff Halper, ICAHD’s Coordinator, told the assembled Mughrabi Quarter residents, “We come as Israelis not only to remember the night the Occupation began but to take responsibility for the actions of our government, responsibility Israel has tried to avoid all these decades.” However, ICAHD’s latest campaign, said Dr. Halper, went beyond mere acknowledgment and solidarity. It represents a further intensifying of ICAHD’s resistance to the Occupation. Meir Margalit, ICAHD’s Field Coordinator, then presented a general overview of Israel’s house demolition policy and its impact on the Palestinian population.

The assembled Israeli and International media were then taken on a tour of the Mughrabi Quarter, visiting a family home that had been recently demolished and was in process of reconstruction as part of the Constructing Peace Campaign. The launch of the Campaign resulted in television interviews of ICAHD staff on Israeli Channel 2, Saudi Arabia English language satellite TV, and CNN. The Jerusalem Post reported the event, as did numerous newspapers around the world.

ICAHD’s PR agency in Tel Aviv was commissioned to find the most efficient and cost effective way of reach the mass of the Israeli public. Initially large newspaper adverts were considered. However after careful analysis it was decided to go ahead with an intensive internet campaign in Hebrew. YNET (in English - http://www.ynetnews.com & in Hebrew - http://www.ynet.co.il), affiliated with the Israeli “Yedioth Ahronot” newspaper and magazine group, is the most visited website in Israel. During the first week in June ICAHD placed specially designed banner advertisements that was linked to the Campaign pages on ICAHD’s website. Over 5,000 people clicked thru to the ICAHD web site during the two weeks of the banner adverts. The YNET online campaign was repeated during the middle of September.

Full page advertisements were published by ICAHD-USA in the New York Times and by ICAHD-UK in the Guardian resulting in a strong response from the general public in those countries.

ICAHD’s ongoing education and advocacy for the Campaign includes a slideshow hosted on its web site and a photo gallery of homes completed during the campaign with stories about many of the families.

To help promote the campaign and to raise additional funds for rebuilding and advocacy, ICAHD has established a dedicated web page

House Demolitions Statistics in the Occupied Territories since 1967

noreply@blogger.com (Fred Schlomka) — Sun, 02 Sep 2007 08:57:00 +0000

These are figures for Palestinian homes. If approximately 120,000 Druze and Arabs were expelled from the Syria Golan Heights in 1967 and their villages (134 in number) were completely demolished, that makes about 20,000 additional demolished homes, assuming six people per family unit. The following sources are by year. In years without sources, the figures were arrived at through interviewing Israeli government or military personnel, or by collecting Palestinian testimonies.

compiled by Jeff Halper, Executive Director, ICAHD
(sources below)

year - number of demolitions
1967 - 6,317
1968 - 140
1969 - 301
1970 - 191
1971 - 2,231
1972 - 35
1973 - 34
1974 - 61
1975 - 77
1976 - 24
1977 - 1
1978 - 2
1979 - 18
1980 - 30
1981 - 24
1982 - 35
1983 - 12
1984 - 2
1985 - 44
1986 - 49
1987 - 104
1988 - 587
1989 - 567
1990 - 306
1991 - 307
1992 - 193
1993 - 130
1994 - 153
1995 - 69
1996 - 168
1997 - 257
1998 - 180
1999 - 142
(Intifada) - 4,747 (2,781 military, 1,966 administrative)
2005 - 290
2006 - 319

TOTAL 18,147

Sources

1967: United Nations General Assembly (1967). “Report of the Secretary-General under General Assembly resolution 2252 (ES-V) and Security Council resolution ).” Retrieved 25 September 2006 from <http://www.domino.un.org>. Thomas Aboud (2000) “The Moroccan Quarter: A History of the Present.” Jerusalem: Jerusalem Quarterly. Retrieved 25 September 2006 from <http://www.jerusalemquarterly.org>. Palestine Remembered (n.d.) “Imwas”, “Bayt Nuba”, “Yalu”. Retrieved 25 September 2006 from <http://www.palestineremembered.com>. The UN Report refers to 850 houses demolished in Qalqilya and 360 in Beit Awa. It also states that the Beit Mersim (Beit Marsam) was entirely demolished and had an original population of approximately 500. We averaged just over 8 people per house to arrive at the figure of 60 houses for this village. Also quoted in the report is the demolition of 18 houses in Surif. Abowd’s articles states that 135 houses were demolished in the Moroccan Quarter of Jerusalem’s Old City. The villages of Imwas, Yalu and Beit Nuba were entirely demolished in 1967. The website “Palestine Remembered” cites the 1931 British census listing 224 houses in Imwas, 245 in Yalu and 226 in Beit Nuba. According to the 1961 Jordanian census, the population of the towns increased by 91%, 70% and 43%. An extremely conservative estimate would be a 10% increase in the amount of housing by the 1961 census, adding a total of 69 more houses for a three-village-total of 764. This total does not include the numbers from the Jordan Valley villages of Nuseirat, Jiftlik, and Arajish, all of which were leveled.

. United Nations General Assembly (1984). “Report of the Secretary-General, Living Conditions of the Palestinian People in the Occupied Palestinian Territories.” Retrieved 25 September 2006 from <http://www.domino.un.org>. This is the source for all statistics on demolitions between 1967 and 1982. In the actual report these are listed as punitive demolitions because all demolitions were classified as “Collective Punishment.”

1971. Human Rights Watch (2004). Razing Rafah. New York: Human Rights Watch. Jeff Halper (2005) Obstacles to Peace (Third Edition). Jerusalem: PalMap. This number is from a mass demolition that took place in the Gaza Strip in August. It happens that Ariel Sharon was the leader of that mission.

1983. Ronny Talmor (1989). Demolition and Sealing of Houses As a punitive measure in the West Bank and Gaza Strip during the Intifada. Jerusalem: B’tselem. This report is the source for the data on punitive demolitions from .

1987. B’tselem (2005). “Statistics on demolition of houses as punishment .” Retrieved 25 September 2006 from <http://www.btselem.org>. All the statistics on punitive house demolitions from come from this source. B’tselem (2006). “Statistics on demolition of houses built without permits.” Retrieved 25 September 2006 from <http://www.btselem.org>. All the statistics on administrative demolitions between come from this source.

1994. Meir Margalit (2006) Discrimination in the Heart of the Holy City. Jerusalem: IPCC. Also personal communication with Dr. Margalit, field researcher for ICAHD. B’tselem (2006). “Statistics on demolition of houses built without permits.” Retrieved 25 September 2006 from <http://www.btselem.org> . UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs ). Weekly Humanitarian Briefings #s 86-178. All statistics about administrative house demolitions between come from these sources.

. B’tselem (2006). “Statistics on houses demolished for alleged military purposes.” Retrieved 25 September 2006 from <http://www.btselem.org>. UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs ). Weekly Humanitarian Briefings #s 86-178

About House Demolitions in the Occupied Territories

noreply@blogger.com (Fred Schlomka) — Sat, 01 Sep 2007 12:05:00 +0000

Home demolitions in the Occupied Territories fall into three general categories:

Lack of building permits. The vast majority of home demolitions fall within this category. Until the Oslo Agreements of 1993 all Palestinians in the Occupied Territories had to apply for a building permit from the Israeli ‘Civil Administration’ in order to build or expand a home. Since 1993 Palestinians living in Jerusalem and area ‘C’ continue to fall under Israeli jurisdiction. East Jerusalem Palestinians apply for permits from the Jerusalem Municipality, while those living in area ‘B’ continue to apply to the Civil Administration. Permit applications are very expensive (over $20,000) and are routinely denied.

Clearing Operations. The clearance of houses for military purposes. Often the homes are too close to Israeli ‘security infrastructure’, Jewish roads, or provide cover for Palestinian military operations. Clearing Operations have continued to be conducted in all areas of the West Bank and Gaza, although to a lesser extent in Area ‘A’, and in Gaza since the 2005 withdrawal.

Punitive Demolitions. Homes of families or neighbors of Palestinians caught or suspected of carrying out attacks against Israelis. This collective punishment policy was ended in 2005 after the army issued a report declaring it counter-productive in reducing terror attacks.