Rabbis For Human Rights: The Annual Report 2012-2013

several major achievements.
The most notable include:
Returning the residents of Bir El
‘Id to additional caves. Even after
RHR returned the residents of Bir
El ‘Id in 2009 to their village, from
which they had been expelled
for almost ten years because of
army backed settler intimidation,
the army has continued to issue
demolition orders on everything
they attempt to build, and say that
even some of the original caves
remained off limits. RHR therefore
celebrated as we returned villagers
to five additional caves, a water
cistern and two animal pens RHR
argued that these lands were part
and parcel of the lands we had
already agreed on in 2009.
Palestinians resumed farming
in areas where they had long
been denied access due to army-
backed settler intimidation in the
Shilo Valley. This success means
that for now the unauthorized
hilltop outposts of Esh Kodesh and
Akhia will again be surrounded
by Palestinian worked fields. RHR
submitted a High Court appeal on
behalf of a land owner in Jalud
to return 256 dunams of land
surrounding Esh Kodesh. Not only
had settlers enforced an expanding
“forbidden zone” year after year,
but in 2011 they actually planted
a vineyard on some of these
lands. Most of the human rights
violations RHR deals with in the
Occupied Territories take place
in Area C (the areas still under
full Israeli control, accounting for
some 60 percent of the total area
of the West Bank). Incredibly the
settlers even blocked access to
lands in Area B (under Palestinian
civil control, but Israeli military
control). Under pressure from
the pending appeal the Legal
Advisor closed the area to Israelis
and ordered that the Palestinian
land owner could access his land
in coordination with the Israeli
army. RHR again
RHR 2013
14
had to pressure the army when
its procrastination almost made
Fawzi Ibrahim miss the planting
season for winter wheat and lose
his investment in seeds. On the first
day the reluctant security forces
were not adequately prepared
to deal with settler opposition,
and ordered the Palestinians out
of the fields. On the second day,
despite primarily female settlers
with babies doing everything they
could to block the tractors, Fawzi
finally plowed most of his land
and sowed his wheat. He has not
yet been allowed into the vineyard
because of a settler appeal, and on
the day he plowed, he discovered
an additional vineyard. An indepth
Channel 2 Television expose
broke the story to the Israeli public,
including the connection with
the ongoing attacks on Kusra (see
above in the OT Field Department
report).
Settlers are increasingly filing
appeals against decisions by
the OT Legal Advisor in order to
delay justice; and accordingly
the failure of such an appeal this
year is particularly significant. In
2006 RHR took on the case of
five families (300 people) who
had been forced off their own
land after their livestock had been
poisoned and after they could
no longer endure the harassment
and physical threats posed by the
radical settler Yaakov Talia, who
set up the unauthorized outpost
he named “Lucifer’s Farm.” In
early 2012 the army closed the
area and announced that the
Palestinian families could return
to working their lands. Talia
appealed the High Court decision
but this year requested to cancel
his claim because he understood
that the law was not on his side.
However, he reserved the right to
appeal again, pointing out that if
the State adopts the Edmund Levi
Committee recommendations, the
law will be on his side. Former
High Court justice Edmund Levi
was appointed by Prime Minister
Netanyahu to head a commission
searching to legalize the building
of settlements on land which the
Israeli government recognizes as
privately-owned Palestinian land.
Noting the fact that there were no
Palestinians on this commission
and wondering whether the
effect on Palestinians was at all a
consideration in the deliberations,
RHR submitted a position paper
documenting village by village the
many ways, beyond the obvious
theft of land, in which the existence
of outposts leads to human rights
violations in the villages where
we work. We also submitted an
extensive section based on Jewish
sources dealing with the image of
God, double standards, property
rights of non-Jews in the Land of
Israel, and the inevitable injustice
created when a group holding
power appropriates for itself the
“burden“ of determining how to
be just towards the powerless and
voiceless.
Last year, we reported that we
had managed to temporarily
freeze the demolition of solar
power installations at Imneizel
village in the South Hebron Hills
following our legal work and
immense international pressure.
Recently, the Israeli authorities
requested that we withdraw our
legal appeal as they decided that
the demolitions were not going to
take place at all.
In response to an RHR petition
demanding that the Israeli army
protect Palestinian property
and possessions, the army was
ordered to pay compensation to
elderly Palestinian land owners
directly underneath the Bat
Ayin settlement, who suffer
repeated attacks and damage to
their 60 year old olive trees in
“Price Tag” attacks. However,
the army made it clear
that the compensation
was not an admission of
responsibility, and refused to take
any additional steps to protect
the farmers and their trees. With
all of the positive improvements
in safe agricultural access after
RHR’s 2006 High Court victory,
this is but one of example of
how authorities have not fulfilled
additional stipulations of the
decision ordering security forces
to protect Palestinian farmers
and to bring people to justice.
RHR therefore took this case to
the Israeli High Court, which in
February 2013 gave the security
forces 60 days to explain why they
were not doing more to protect the
landowners.
The Assad family from the village
of El-Khader (between Alon Shvut
and Elazar), has been plagued by
constant settler harassment and
land encroachment. The extremist
settler organization Women in
With our intervention, the family now is able
to access lands that had been inaccessible for
more than a decade.
Green repeatedly has trespassed
on these lands where they have
planted saplings, olive trees and
even erected several benches with
plaques in honor of the donors.
The Civil Administration in Beit
El heeded our request that the
area be closed to Israelis in order
to prevent further incursions into
the lands and ordered the army to
remove the trees planted.
Since the Second Intifada, the
Hajaja-Jabarin family, whose
lands are adjacent to Tekoa, has
been subjected to constant land
closures by the army, attacks by
neighboring settlers on both person
and property, and attempts to
appropriate land by planting trees.
RHR submitted several requests to
the Civil Administration that it take
action against the settlers and the
army. With our intervention, the
family now is able to access lands
that had been inaccessible for
more than a decade.
RHR is appealing the decision to
allow the family to access their
lands only by prior coordination
with the Civil Administration and
is demanding free access to these
lands.
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