Rabbis For Human Rights: The Annual Report 2012-2013

Renovating Water Cisterns in South Hebron Hills
In 2012, Israel destroyed at least 35 rainwater cisterns used by Palestinian communities, 20 of them in the area
of Hebron and the southern Hebron Hills. Usually, the communities whose cisterns were destroyed are a short
distance from settlements and unauthorized outposts that enjoy a regular water supply. While these outposts have
no permits the Civil Administration almost always destroys Palestinian tents, animal pens and food storage facilities
for the lack of permit. Drying up the water supply of Palestinians is an affront to our basic religious and human
morals.
In the summer of 2012, in response to this critical situation, Rabbis for Human Rights began assisting Palestinians
in renovating destroyed water cisterns in the South Hebron Hills. We coordinated with both Ta’ayush and the
Palestinian NGO “EWASH,” which specializes in water rights. Twelve student volunteers from the Canadian
organization “Operations Groundswell” participated in this program. The group and some of our staff members
spent a week renovating a cistern at Bir El Id, near Mitzpe Yair, one of the more radical outposts. The group dug out
the cistern and transformed it from an unusable source of water to one that could start operating again. A week later
after we had dug out this cistern, we learned that Hajj Ismail, upon whose land the cistern is located, was severely
attacked with a knife by four masked settlers. It is possible that this attack was a response to our work there.
Advocating on behalf of the Jahalin Bedouin
The Jahalin tribe were uprooted from
their lands in Tel Arad in the Negev
in the early 1950s and resettled
in the West Bank. Until 1967 the
Jahalin preserved their traditional
Bedouin lifestyle of thousands of
years, supporting themselves mainly
through herding. With the onset of
the Israeli occupation, the Israeli
army took control of large swaths
of the Jahalin tribe’s grazing areas
in the Jordan Valley, closing them
off to Palestinians. The Jahalin were
consequently squeezed into the area
of the Jerusalem-Jericho highway and
forced to abandon their traditional
way of life. Since the establishment
of Ma’aleh Adumim in 1975, the
expanding settlement has repeatedly
displaced Jahalin encampments.
Rabbis for Human Rights has been
advocating on behalf of the rights of
the Jahalin Bedouin since 1997 when
an encampment was demolished,
and the Jahalin were given shipping
containers to live in on an exposed
hilltop near the Abu Dis garbage
dump.
In November 2011 we learned that
the Civil Administration had reached
an advanced stage of planning for
the forced relocation of 600 Jahalin
living near Mishor Adumim to a
landfill site even closer to the dump.
Such a plan, if implemented, would
seriously endanger the health of the
Jahalin.
To help change the face of Israel, and
to encourage the Israeli government
to act on behalf of our Jewish
values, we quickly launched both
international and local campaigns
and protests, with the help of the
Catholic Comboni Sisters and the
Jahalin Association.
We asked our supporters to send
letters protesting the plan to move
the Jahalin to the garbage dump, and
many of you responded. We also
initiated a campaign appealing to
Jewish leaders abroad, while B’Tselem
organized tours for journalists and
international diplomats.
Although the 18th Knesset was
reluctant to intervene on behalf
of Palestinians in the Occupied
Territories, even in cases of gross
violations of human rights, in this
case the details of the developments
and an outpouring of international
concern permitted us to request a
session to discuss the matter in a
joint meeting of the Environment
and Health Committees, headed
by MK Dov Khenin. We asked
the committee to direct the Civil
Administration to reverse its decision
to adopt the plan to move the Jahalin
to the dump in Abu Dis.
Despite the positions of MKs Arye
Eldad and Uri Ariel of the National
Union Party, and of Uri Maklev of
United Torah Judaism, and despite
the claims by the representative
of the Ministry of Environment
that the site was scheduled to
close, in the end the Ministry of
Defense representative announced
that its ministry would conduct a
comprehensive risk assessment to
cover the environmental risks in the
area slated to absorb the Jahalin;
only afterwards would any plans
be crystallized regarding the actual
relocation – and then only through
dialogue with the residents.
In addition to promising to relocate
the Jahalin only in dialogue with the
Jahalin, the Bedouin community of
Khan El Akhmar was also promised
that its school, built of tires and
mud, would be allowed to continue
until an alternative location was
agreed. This effectively cancelled
the demolition order against the
school until an alternative location is
finalized, much to the delight of the
85 children who attend the school
and their parents. RHR believes
that the right to education is a basic
human right, as well as one rooted
within our Jewish tradition.
RHR welcomed these decisions,
but the Israeli authorities still plan
to demolish the school and to
To help change the face of Israel,
and to encourage the Israeli government
to act on behalf of our Jewish values, we
quickly launched both international and
local campaigns and protests
displace all the Bedouin in the area,
including those in the adjacent E1
corridor. Having finished their study
of health and other Bedouin issues,
the Civil Administration has suggested
two options to the Jahalin, both of
which would entail displacing other
Palestinians. The Jahalin reject this,
but are willing to consider options in
the Jerusalem-Dead Sea corridor on
land that does not belong to others.
This past summer, RHR again
organized English and Hebrew
lessons for the children in Khan El
Akhmar and al-Jabal. Together with
the Catholic Comboni Sisters, three
RHR volunteers, and Ibtisam Hirsh, a
local Bedouin woman, we organized
a summer camp for 70 children,
during which we even took the kids
to the beach in Tel Aviv for a day. For
most of the children this was the first
time they had ever seen the sea.
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