- 23 juli 2011
Lebanon to define sea border with Israel
Lebanese parliament
The Lebanese parliament is set to review a law to outline its maritime border with Israel, a Lebanese minister says, following a dispute with Tel Aviv over sea boundaries.
Lebanese Minister of Energy and Water Resources Gebran Bassil said the country's cabinet and parliament have set plans to place the issue of Lebanon's maritime border with Israel on the agenda and discuss the case so that the country can start exploring offshore gas and oil resources.
“Any laxity from our part will be used by Israel to harm Lebanon,” Xinhua quoted Bassil as saying on Friday.
The decision to delineate the Middle Eastern country's maritime borders was made in response to Israel's plans to explore gas, with the help of American energy companies, near Lebanese territorial waters.
Israel's drilling plans came after a US-Israeli consortium's announcement of the discovery of major gas reserves in Lebanon's territorial waters.
Earlier, Head of the Hezbollah bloc in the Lebanese parliament Mohammed Raad warned Israel against violating Lebanon's sovereignty by exploring disputed waters to search for gas and oil in the Mediterranean Sea.
Israel set a maritime boundary with Lebanon and submitted the document to the United Nations earlier this month. Lebanon, however, submitted its proposed maritime boundary with Israel to the United Nations over a year ago. Yet, the Israeli map conflicts significantly with the one Lebanon provided.
Meanwhile, the energy committee of the Lebanese parliament announced that Lebanon might be obliged to lodge a complaint against Israel before the UN Security Council after Tel Aviv's proposed maritime borders, which were approved earlier this month, allegedly infringed on 860 square kilometers of the Lebanese waters.
Israel has said it is eyeing the Leviathan natural gas field near Haifa, which extends into the Lebanese waters. The Leviathan field could hold as much as 16 trillion square feet of natural gas (valued at more than USD 95 billion) and, 4.2 billion barrels of oil.
The field is located in the joint regional waters between Lebanon and northern Palestine. Lebanon contends that it owns a major part of Leviathan.
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/190346.html 5 dec 2011, 10:14 , Respect -
Maria 25 juli 2011
IOA decides to raze mosque in Bruqin town
SALFIT, (PIC)-- The Israeli occupation authority (IOA) ordered for the second time the demolition of Ali Bin Abu Talib Mosque in Bruqin town, west of Salfit city, at the pretext of unlicensed construction.
Head of the municipal council in Bruqin Ikrimah Samara said he had received a similar order earlier last month, affirming that the IOA still refuses to approve its suggested structural layout of the town.
Samara appealed to international human rights organization active in the occupied Palestinian lands to pressure the IOA to endorse the new layout to save dozens of homes from demolition.
Two months ago in the same town, the IOA demolished a school for girls whose construction was funded by USAID, although it was licensed and legal.
http://fwd4.me/0i7R
Hamas asks Arab League, OIC to protect holy shrines
DAMASCUS, (PIC)-- Hamas has condemned the Israeli oppressive decision to demolish a mosque in Brukin village, recalling that it was preceded by a similar decision last month to raze an educational institute.
In a press release on Monday, Hamas said that that Israeli occupation authority was planning to seize more Palestinian land to make way for its settlement projects.
Hamas said that the Israeli “criminal” decision reflected a “racist policy”, other than being a flagrant violation of holy shrines, freedom of worship, and the right of Palestinian citizens to live freely on their land.
The movement called on the Palestinian people to stand up to such crimes with more steadfastness and resistance and to unite based on a program that would protect constants and defend rights.
Hamas finally called on the Arab League and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation to immediately act to check the Israeli arrogant practices topped by demolishing mosques and confiscating Palestinian land.
http://fwd4.me/0i7N 5 dec 2011, 10:14 , Respect -
Maria 26 juli 2011
Nasrallah warns Israel against theft
(2:23) Hezbollah warns Israel on 2006 war anniv. - Press TV News
Hezbollah Secretary General Seyyed Hassan Nasrallah has warned Israel against encroaching on Lebanon's territorial waters and stealing its oil and gas reserves.
In a televised speech on Tuesday to mark the fifth anniversary of Hezbollah victory against Israel in the July 2006 war, Nasrallah warned that the resistance movement will confront any aggressive attempt by Tel Aviv to carry out oil and gas exploration in the Lebanese territorial waters.
Hezbollah secretary general warned that any damage to Lebanon's future oil facilities will be retaliated.
"Those who harm our installations will have their own installations harmed," he warned. "We warn Israel not to touch this area or try to steal Lebanon's resources."
Nasrallah said that the reserves could provide Lebanon with a “golden opportunity” to rebuild its economy.
Hezbollah's secretary general stressed that any possible war against Lebanon will have disastrous consequences for Israel.
Enemy is aware of the reality that the Lebanese resistance movement is today stronger than ever, Nasrallah stated.
He also noted that billions of dollars are being spent on tarnishing Hezbollah's image, because Israel did not achieve its aims during its war against Lebanon.
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/190945.html 5 dec 2011, 10:15 , Respect -
Maria 26 juli 2011
Palestinian well under threat of demolition
Forwarded message --From: Maisa
Dear
i hope this E-Mail finds you well.
I write to you on behalf of my company - MADICO, a palestinian family owned business specialized in the production of Medjoul Dates and located in the occupied Palestinian territories, in Jericho. The reason i write is to ask for your support - or that of someone who might be able to help on the following issue. The Israeli authorities have issued our company with a warning, yesterday morning, to demolish the water well from which we water all of our Palm trees. This decision means destroying 4000 Date Palm trees, 35 jobs and 35 Palestinian families.
This although the well is in area A. Also, we started all the required procedures weeks ago and on time, in order to renew the already existing liscence from both the israeli and the palestinian authorities.
The Israeli authorities have given us 3 days, starting yesterday, to submit all the necessay documents to stop the destruction of the well, but since the three days happen to be a thursday, friday (palestinian weekend) and a saturday (palestinian and israeli weekend), we find it very difficult to reach anyone or do anything about it. This means that the well might be destroyed on sunday morning.
Today, we faxed the objection letter along with the other needed documents to the responsible authorities, as demanded in their warning.
The whole story is as follows:
We have an old water well from 1961 that is legally permitted through the jordanian authority.
In 2007, we tried to renew the liscence to reactivate the well because we wanted to cultivate our land and plant it with Medjoul Date Palms but the Israeli army stopped us saying it is a C area and that we need a permission. After some research and information digging we figured out that, according to official maps, the area is A and not C (we have documents to prove that).
We stopped and applied for the permission from both the Israeli and the Palestinian Authorities .
We got the Palestinian approval while the Israelis said it is not their responsibility, according to what my lawyer at that time said.
We planted the Dates in 2007 and 2008 and irrigated them from the well, no one bothered or said anything.
On the 29th of August 2008, the Israelis gave us another warning. We sent them another letter through a new lawyer ,who informed us that everything is OK .
Again, until 05 May 2011, No one disturbed or said aything. Until on that day, we got a new warning from the Israeli authorities saying that we need a permission for the well ,the Irrigation Computer Shelter and the Housing place of the workers at the farm. Also, that we need to stop using the well, otherwise they will remove everything at our cost.
Now, we have 4000 Date palm trees and we have to buy water so as not to loose our trees, although the well is there. This costs us 7 times more than using the existing well and it is not a secured water source.
We applied several times to both the israeli civil administration and the Palestinian water authority but we are still waiting for their final answer.
All warnings and documents as well as the decision of the <> or what they called Civil organisation Authority are with us and can be sent to you upon request.
Your help is highly appreciated.
Thank you for your efforts.
Best Regards,
Maisa Almanasreh
Operations Manager I MADICO
Phone: + 972 (0) 597093030
E-Mail: [email protected]
www.madico.ps
http://kibush.co.il/show_file.asp?num=47856
Al-Arakib - Sixty Years, and the Struggle is Just Beginning
By Adam Keller/Gush Shalom
Al-Arakib is a village in Israel, northeast of Beersheba. A village which does not appear on any map published in this country, a village whose existence the Government of Israel does not recognize and does all in its power to make sure that it would indeed no longer be there - and yet, in spite of all that the government can do, the village is very much alive. At just the moment that I write this, the children of Al-Arakib are very loudly singing and dancing at the center of their village.
The village of Al-Arakib existed in the Negev, under the Ottoman Empire, long before a Viennese Jew named Theodor Herzl convened a conference at Zurich, Switzerland to call for the creation of a Jewish state. Sheikh Mohammed Son of Salem al-Okbi owned six thousand dunums of land at Al-Arakib. He employed twelve field hands who plowed and sowed the ground each season and sold the surplus produce to traders from Gaza, Jordan and Sinai. The Ottoman Government did virtually nothing for the villagers, but nor did it interfere much with them and certainly never tried to deprive them of their land.
In 1917 British soldiers who came from the south to conquer the land passed near Al-Arakib. An artillery shell fired at the retreating Ottoman soldiers hit the house of Sheikh Mohammed and destroyed it. But with the consolidation of the British Mandate rule the house was rebuilt, and the new British government also did not interfere much in the life of the Al-Arakib residents and left them to live quietly on their land. And in 1948 a new rule again came to Al-Arakib, the rule of the newly-established State of Israel. And at first the people of Al-Arakib thought that also under this regime they could live as they had lived all those years under the earlier rulers.
During Israel's two first years, the villagers' way of life seemed to be respected. Indeed, the home of Sheikh Suleiman son of Muhammad al-Okbi was used by the State of Israel as a Tribal Court, empowered to settle disputes among the Bedouins of the area, and Israel's National Flag was always hoisted on the roof when the court was in session.
The illusion was shattered on a single bitter day in 1951. Soldiers of the Israeli Defense Forces, on behalf of the military government under which Arab citizens of Israel then lived, arrived and ordered the residents of Al-Arakib to leave immediately their homes. After six months they could return, so they were told, but years passed in their place of exile and the day for going back never came. When in 1954 Sheikh Suleiman tried to return to his home, soldiers promptly arrive to take him into custody at Beersheba.
And the village houses were destroyed and razed to the ground, including the house which the State of Israel had used as a court of law and the house in which the polling station had been placed for the first Knesset elections in 1949. And in the Land Registry of the State of Israel it was duly noted that this parcel of land was "an uncultivated and unoccupied property" and therefore it was registered as the property of "The Development Authority", i.e. of the government of Israel. And when the al-Okbis tried again to go back and cultivate their land in 1973, they were charged with trespassing on State Lands. And the same with Nuri al-Okbi, son of Sheikh Suleiman and the grandson of Sheikh Mohammed - who is himself not a sheikh but an activist for the rights of his people, the Bedouins. He had set up a tent on a small portion of the land of his ancestors, and lived in it day and night for several years until the police came to arrest him on charges of trespassing and a court sternly warned him that repetition of that offense might entail a long prison term.
And not just him. Hundreds of the al-Turis, neighbors of the al-Okbis who had also been expelled in 1951, returned in an organized way to their ancestral lands at Al-Arakib, near the cemetery where family members had been buried for over a hundred years - land of which the state had made no use of any kind during all the decades that it was in its possession . And they rebuilt their homes and farmed the fields and planted olive trees and returned at least part of al Araqib village to life.
And the authorities were far from pleased, and demolition and eviction orders were issued against the residents, and the sown grain fields were destroyed by aerial spraying, and after the Supreme Court banned the aerial spraying the Israel Lands Administration began to plow the lands and destroy the newly sprouted corn. And the residents, undeterred, continued to farm the land and sow again and again.
Exactly a year ago, on July 27, 2010, the police and Border Guards and Israel Lands Administration mobilized no less than 1,300 men under arms, accompanied by bulldozers and heavy equipment, to raid the village and surround it on all sides and destroy and raze it to the ground and uproot the olive trees to the very last one and make it again "uncultivated and unoccupied" as it was when the state registered it in its name.
But these are not the 1950's, and this time the land was not left empty for decades. The residents did not give up, and they came back and built their homes again the very next day - if not actual houses, at least huts to give a degree of shelter from the desert sun and the cold nights. And once again the police came and destroyed everything and again the residents rebuilt – and so it went on all of the past year, twenty-four times at least. There was increased police violence during the arrest of villagers and of the Jewish and Arab volunteers who came to help them, and once again the village was rebuilt the next day or even the same night, and again the government representatives came to destroy it, and so on and on and on…
Meanwhile, the government passed a directive to the Jewish National Fund to begin forestry work and plant a wood where the Al-Arakib houses stood, and also where olive trees had been planted by the villagers. (The trees which the JNF plans to plant in their place would bear no fruit...). "Making the desert bloom", the JNF's decades-old slogan, seems now a bit less attractive. And the villagers appealed to the District Court, and the judge admonished the JNF for establishing facts on the ground when the disputed ownership of the Al-Arakib lands has not yet been decided on.
The activities of the JNF's bulldozers at al - Al-Arakib were also heard of beyond the borders of Israel, and British TV aired an extensive item article about it, and the British Prime Minister David Cameron announced the termination of position as "A Honorary Patron of the Jewish National Fund". The JNF was one of various registered charities in which the British PM had this position, but it became a bit embarrassing in light of the Jewish National Fund's less than charitable activities at Al-Arakib...
Actually, the problem should have been solved already years ago, when the Government of Israel appointed a fact-finding commission headed by former judge Eliezer Goldberg, to deal with the Bedouin Problem. It deliberated for more than a year, heard testimonies – including even from the Bedouins themselves - and its recommendations called for giving formal recognition to the "unrecognized" Bedouin villages in the Negev – which might have been applied to Al-Arakib, too. But many influential people in the government and the Knesset did not like that recommendation, and a new committee was appointed, headed by Ehud Praver of the Prime Minister's Office, and this second committee did not bother hearing the opinion of the Bedouins, and decided that most of the unrecognized villages should be destroyed and some thirty thousand people transferred to (jobless) townships.
But these aforementioned influential people did not quite like these recommendations, either, because they did still include some recognition of Bedouin land ownership rights. And so the PM's National Security Adviser, Binyamin Amidror, asked that publication of the conclusions be delayed, because he wanted to make some changes and amendments. Which are not likely to be changes in favor of the Bedouins...
Meanwhile, at Al-Arakib life goes on as usual, and the latest destruction so far took place on Thursday last week. And yesterday, to mark the anniversary of the 2010 destruction, dozens of activists came over from Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, and youths from villages in the Galilee who held a summer camp in the Negev, and American Christians peace activists of the CPT, usually based in Hebron, and some Palestinians from the Occupied Territories who managed to gain a rare entry permit. And together they rebuilt Al-Arakib for the twenty-fifth time (some say the twenty-seventh), and twelve strong and sturdy huts were erected.
And on Friday afternoon, there was a common prayer of Muslims, Jews and Christians. And three young women activists encamped at the tent camp in Tel Aviv's Rothschild Boulevard came and held a presentation for the Al-Arakib children who received them with great applause, and tonight a delegation of Al-Arakib residents will take part in the protest march of young Tel Avivians who are rendered homeless by the scarcity and soaring prices of housing in their city. And on the coming Wednesday - July 27, 2011, the exact anniversary of the 2010 destruction - villagers and supporters of their struggle from all over the country will at 6:30 pm hold a picket and torchlight parade at the Lehavim Junction, on the highway near to Al-Arakib.
Not that anyone has illusions. The police will come again, and the huts erected now will be destroyed and need to be replaced by new ones. The Government of Israel has not given up its intention to wipe Al-Arakib off the face of the Earth. But the villagers have definitely not given up, either.
http://fwd4.me/0i7Q...Read more 5 dec 2011, 10:15 , Respect -
Maria 5 dec 2011, 10:15 , Respect -
Maria 27 juli 2011
Israeli forces raze agricultural lands in Bethlehem
Israel's occupation forces stormed into Walja village in the Bethlehem governorate (south of the occupied West Bank) on Tuesday, July 26. Several bulldozers were used to raze Walja's agricultural lands in order to make way for the construction of the Apartheid [Separation] Wall.
A member of the Popular Committee to Resist the Wall and Settlements, 'Alaa Al Darras, said the occupation's bulldozers and machinery started the operation in the early hours of Tuesday; bulldozing wide areas of Walja's lands planted with pine and olive trees.
Residents succeeded in stopping the Israeli bulldozers for a few hours, before a large contingent came to reinforce and support the operation.
Eyewitnesses reported the Israeli forces and machinery sealed off the Ein Joweizah area located in the northwest of Bethlehem after they attacked journalists who were present in the area to cover the incident. A group of Spanish solidarity activists supporting the villagers were also attacked by the Israeli forces.
The targeted area has been subjected to rising settlement-related activities. In their attempt to annex the area which borders occupied Jerusalem, Israeli forces have demolished a number of Palestinian homes, with similar demolition orders issued for others.
http://fwd4.me/0i7M 5 dec 2011, 10:15 , Respect -
Maria 28 juli 2011
IOA delivers demolition warning to inhabitants of a building in OJ
OCCUPIED JERUSALEM, (PIC)-- The Israeli occupation authority-controlled Jerusalem municipality handed a demolition warning to inhabitants of a building in Beit Hanina.
One of the inhabitants Mohammed Asfour said that municipality staffers escorted by Israeli policemen handed them evacuation orders in preparation for demolishing the five-story building at the pretext that it was built without permit 13 years ago!
The building is inhabited by seven Palestinian families composed of 45 individuals and has a number of shops on its first floor.
In a related development, the Quds international institution said in its second report for this year that time was not in favor of the indigenous inhabitants of occupied Jerusalem, warning that the IOA was escalating Judaization efforts of the holy city.
http://fwd4.me/0i7L
Israeli bulldozers edge ever closer to… Al Badawi
Yesterday there were more arrests in al Walaja, the village west of Bethlehem which is being enveloped by The Wall, as people protested against the destruction of village land. Once again Dr Mazin Qumsiyeh was arrested by Israeli soldiers (for the third time), as were Sherin Al-Araj and five Israeli anti-occupation activists.
That news is bad enough but those arrested will no doubt survive. The same might not be true of al Badawi, the village’s oldest inhabitant. Al Badawi is a magnificent 5,000 year old olive tree, perhaps the oldest in the world. It stands in The Wall’s path and, according to reports from Palestinian news sources, Israeli bulldozers are edging ever closer. The fear is that this tree along with many others will be destroyed.
Al Badawi stands on the north-facing slopes of al Walaja which plunge steeply down into Wadi-el- Jundi where The Green Line follows the valley bottom and the Jerusalem to Tel Aviv railway line. On the opposite side of the valley, above the Biblical Zoo, is the site of the original village of al Walaja. In 1948 al Badawi would have been witness, in October of that year, to its conquest by Israeli troops. The inhabitants fled. Some made their way across Wadi-el-Jundi and built al Walaja again. 63 years later al Walaja’s existence is once more under threat. This time one of the world’s finest trees is threatened.
http://fwd4.me/0i7E 5 dec 2011, 10:15 , Respect -
Maria 29 juli 2011
Israeli Home Demolition Terrorism
by Stephen Lendman
Co-founded (with Meir Marglit) and directed by Jeff Halper, the Israeli Committee Against Home Demolitions (ICAHD) “is a non-violent, direct-action organization established in 1998 to resist Israeli demolition of Palestinian houses in the Occupied Territories.”
ICAHD also helps rebuild homes. In addition, it resists “land expropriation, settlement expansions, by-pass road construction, policies of ‘closure’ and ‘separation,’ ” as well as destruction of agricultural land and crops. It also works for peace, equity, and ending Israel’s illegal occupation.
Access its web site through the following link:
http://www.icahd.org/
It estimates over 24,800 West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza houses demolished since 1967 (4,247 during Cast Lead, according to the UN).
It classifies demolition types as:
– punishment for actions associated with the structures (about 8.5%);
– administrative for lacking building permits (about 26%);
– land-clearing/military demolitions for any reason, including achieving IDF goals or accompanying extrajudicial assassinations (about 65.5%); and
– other undefined reasons.
In fact, Israel’s demolition and displacement policies are serious international law breaches for any reason. Nonetheless, they continue as official state policy to steal Palestinian land for Israelis, an issue Western media ignore, as well as other Israeli crimes of war and against humanity.
On June 27, the Association for Civil Rights in Israel (ACRI) said the Knesset Constitution, Law, and Justice Committee passed a first draft of a law requiring Palestinians to pay house demolition costs with no judicial review.
ACRI and Bimkom: Planners for Planning Rights petitioned the committee, calling the measure extreme, adding that without judicial review “there is no option for the owners to demolish the structure themselves,” a much cheaper procedure.
Moreover, this legislation gives administrative authorities “unbalanced” demolition freedom, including to bulldoze homes in “structurally disadvantaged communities such as Bedouins in unrecognized communities” and Palestinians in East Jerusalem.
A “softened version of the bill” lets courts decide whether costs should be imposed and how much. It’s expected to become law.
On July 21, a new UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) report documented alarming numbers of West Bank Area C demolitions and forced displacements, saying more occurred (342) so far in 2011 than in 2009 and 2010 combined.
Based on field visits to 13 Area C communities, the report said “restrictive policies and practices of the Israeli authorities, including movement and access restrictions, settlement activity and restrictions on Palestinian construction” force most Palestinians to leave.
It added that thousands more are at risk because 3,000 demolition orders have been issued, including against 18 schools.
On July 18, ICAHD reported “a new wave of demolition orders, stop-building orders, property confiscations, settler harassment and multiple warnings of imminent eviction(s) by the Israeli Civil Administration….”
Most affected are Jerusalem periphery Bedouin communities, “exhausted of alternative coping strategies.” As a result, they’re appealing for international protection against demolitions, forced displacements and relocations, what many of them have experienced before.
Khan al Ahmar and Wadi Abu Hindi communities (near Maale Adumim settlement) are especially targeted. Since May, all Wadi Abu Hindi structures got stop-building orders. The community was also told that their land was expropriated for the Separation Barrier.
Khan al Ahmar got four new stop-building orders and notification that final stop-work/demolition orders for 10 – 12 houses will be executed. Moreover, Jahilin community residents fear they may be next.
More Land Theft Planned
On July 22, Haaretz writer Akiva Eldar headlined, “IDF Civil Administration pushing for land takeover in West Bank,” saying:
According to an internal IDF document, new construction is planned “not only around settlement blocs like Ariel, Ma’aleh Adumim and Gush Etzion, but also in strategic areas like the Jordan Valley and Dead Sea.”
Prepared by Lt. Col. Zvi Cohen, it says the custodian of government property may take possession of undefined ownership lands, including in the Jordan Valley and northern Dead Sea. Doing so, however, will further cantonize Palestine, making it harder than ever to establish an independent continuous territory state.
In response, Rabbis for Human Rights said:
“(A ) politically motivated land policy must not come at the expense of the rights of a population subjected to occupation, which is excluded from the decision-making processes of those shaping its destiny. The procedures empower the ability to use the mechanism Israel set up for declaring ‘state lands’ for the purpose of dispossessing Palestinian communities and individuals of their rights and lands.”
According to Dror Etkes, an activist monitoring settlement construction, the IDF document reveals how political and military officials work against Palestinians’ interests. Nearly always, procedures for declaring state lands benefit settlers alone.
“That’s the main way Israel enforces its discriminatory land policy which aims to evict the Palestinians from most of the West Bank and take possession of these territories.”
Moreover, Israel’s Interior Ministry recently authorized “the enlargement of 2,000 illegal homes” in East Jerusalem’s Ramat Shlomo neighborhood.
And now this, according to Haaretz writer Jack Khoury. On July 27, he headlined “Israel sues 34 Bedouin(s) for costs of repeated demolitions of their homes,” saying:
The unprecedented suit seeks 1.8 million NIS (New Israeli Shekels) in damages. About 3.4 NIS = one dollar.
Despite Bedouins and other Palestinians building on their own land, the Israel Land Administration (ILA) claims those charged built homes in Al-Arakib, northeast of Be’er Sheva, “on what had been state land since the time of Ottoman rule.”
It ended in 1918. Israel became a state in 1948. ILA’s claim is bogus, offensive and illegal, but it’s not deterred from its longstanding policy to steal as much Palestinian land as possible, destroying their property and dispossessing them lawlessly.
According to ILA:
“The squatters against whom the suit was brought, of the Abu Madigham and the Abu Jaber families, already have houses built on land the state gave them in the area of Rahat.” It said they keep returning to disputed land, despite court orders prohibiting them from doing so.
Israeli audacity gives chutzpah new meaning, calling Palestinian land “disputed,” prohibiting them from living on it, demolishing their property when they do, and now suing them for demolition costs.
ILA also claimed Bedouins use PR deception, accusing Israel of repression when they’re in breach of the law. It said the disputed land was leased until 1998 for seasonal agricultural activities. However, “defendants ousted the leasees and began squatting on the land.”
In 1999, state authorities acted to evict them. In March 2000, a permanent injunction barred them from the land, except to visit a cemetery and mosque, the only structures there at the time. ILA said suing is “an efficient way to deal with squatters and illegal construction.”
Al-Arakib village leader Sheikh Siyah Abu Madigham said neither he or his family were told about the suit. In fact, he first heard of it through the media, saying:
“We also submit a lot of complaints but no one listens to us, about all the buildings of ours that they destroyed – that the state does not care. The first demolition cost us NIS 4 million. The trees that were uprooted in the village cost us NIS 500,000. They destroyed the village 27 times. That cost us NIS 150,000 each time.”
Awad Abu-Frih, Al-Arakib activist against the demolition, said residents expect Israel to compensate them for damages, not the other way around, explaining:
“The state is afraid of a precedent over Al-Arakib, and so they talk to us in a language reserved for enemies who must be defeated, so the hold over the land won’t be an inspiration to other Bedouin(s) in the Negev.”
He added that every time Israel destroys their village, hundreds of Bedouins, Jews and foreign volunteers rebuild it.
According to Thabet Abu Ras of the Adalah Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights:
“The state recognizes ownership rights over the lands of Al-Arakib and is constantly offering (Bedouins) meager compensation for the land. What’s more, a law requiring the builder of a house to pay for its demolition was not passed by the Knesset.”
Previously, Israel demanded Galilee and central Israel Arab communities pay demolition costs, cases still being litigated. However, they’re against homes built on private, not state, land. The new suit is the first time such a large number of Palestinians are affected. Indeed, it gives chutzpah new meaning.
Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago and can be reached at [email protected].
Also visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com and listen to cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on the Progressive Radio News Hour on the Progressive Radio Network Thursdays at 10AM US Central time and Saturdays and Sundays at noon. All programs are archived for easy listening.
http://www.progressiveradionetwork.com/the-progressive-news-hour/.
http://sjlendman.blogspot.com/ 5 dec 2011, 10:16 , Respect -
Maria 5 dec 2011, 14:06 , Respect -
Maria 31 juli 2011
Israel continues to plough through Salfit farmlands
SALFIT, (PIC)-- Israeli bulldozers have continued to plough through farmland in the northern West Bank province of Salfit, locals said.
They reported that bulldozers have been leveling land and crushing boulders round the clock to pave the way for roads to be built near 19 nearby Jewish settlements.
Also being excavated is land on the western side of Salfit city as well as in the towns of Kafr al-Deik, Deir Istya, and Burqin, where new industrial building and expansion is taking place. The area is known by settlers as West Ariel, which lies near an Israeli industrial area called Burkan.
Crushing machines have been brought to the site to break down stones for the manufacture of raw materials used to pave the roads and also to pave the way for building more settlement units and large-scale factories.
http://fwd4.me/0i7D