Israel/Palestine
Related: About this forumIsrael Supreme Court: Bedouin have no indigenous rights
Israels Supreme Court made a significant ruling this week, setting a precedent for the state to approve the expropriation of Palestinian land in future cases, specifically inside Israel.
The court rejected a five-year old petition filed by the Al Uqbi family to recognize its ownership over a large plot of land in Israels Negev/Naqab Desert. The land also includes the unrecognized village Al Arakib, which is still in its own legal battle for recognition from the state.
The decision not only fails to acknowledge the distinct historical and cultural heritage of this Bedouin community, it is also a major contradiction: while Bedouin property rights are not recognized, the Zionist purchase of land from Bedouin before the state was established is. If the court recognizes land deals made with the Bedouin, it necessarily implies that it recognizes their ownership. But according to Sfard, the court simply disregarded this fact. Israeli officials often claim that the country was established through the legitimate purchase of land from Arabs, not through forceful expropriation.
The bottom line: hundreds of thousands of Bedouin have lived for centuries in the Negev, but as the court astonishingly said, the Bedouin way of life does not create any legal rights in the lands they lived on and cultivated for generations, Michael Sfard says.
http://972mag.com/israel-supreme-court-bedouin-have-no-indigenous-rights/107171/
Jefferson23
(30,099 posts)Jefferson23
(30,099 posts)The Bedouin are taking over the Negev.
Panels Ltd. recently conducted a poll for Rabbis For Human Rights. Initially, 87% of Jewish Israelis agreed that The Bedouin are taking over the Negev, on an average believing that the Bedouin claim 43.9% of the Negev. After learning that the Bedouin claim only 5.4% of the Negev, a majority indicated that this was fair (47 %, vs. 34.6%)
2. The Bedouin never owned the land.
Many Bedouin do not have Western proofs of ownership. However, their meticulous land ownership system was honored by the Ottomans and the British and recognized by the pre-State Zionist Movement. The British kept a written record of Bedouin land ownership that mysteriously disappeared in the State archives. Scholars have found part of these records. In 1920, the PLDC of the Zionist Federation recorded 2.6 million dunam of land in the Negev as owned by the Bedouin. Today, the Bedouin are claiming a mere 650,000 dunam. These documents are available for all to see. We cannot say that the Bedouin did not own their lands.
Many insisted that the Bedouin dont really own land. We have been told, Bedouin claims were disproved in court. Some villages, such as El-Araqib, have Turkish, British and even Israeli documentation of ownership, based on Western bills of purchase, titles, etc. However, the government is currently asking the High Court to reconsider its ruling that El-Araqib residents must have their day in District Court. The High Court rejected the governments claim that their proofs of ownership are moot because the land was expropriated in 1953. The Begin/Praver plan could solve the governments problem. The bill contains a map of where Bedouin will be allowed to live, chillingly reminiscent of the map defining where Jews were allowed to live in late 19th century Russia. El-Araqib is outside the permitted zone.
3. This plan is for the Bedouins own good.
Many argue that Israel must concentrate the Bedouin to provide water, electricity, jobs and training. In the Negev there are smaller and more far flung Jewish communities receiving services even single family farms. More communities are planned. We wouldnt refuse water and electricity to Jewish communities. The State would not tell me, We are going to move you for your own good. Furthermore, government statistics show that poverty and unemployment are four times higher in the townships than in the recognized villages. Recognizing the 35 Unrecognized villages is simply better policy than transfer to the townships.
The question of where the Bedouin should live must be separated from the question of land ownership. Will the Bedouin be better off without their land? The best possible outcome for those who live within the Bedouin pale of settlement, and whom the committee the bill will create determines to be deserving, is that they will receive 50% of their land (or alternative land) and compensation. If neighbors dont cooperate, that percentage goes down to 20%. If one doesnt sign everything else away, one receives nothing.
MK Issawi Freij summed it up best, We will give you water if you give us your lands. Yaakov once said to Esau, I will give you food if you give me your birthright. He thought he was being clever, but the price was anger, enmity, and twenty years of exile and estrangement from his brother.
There is another way. After Israeli media personality Avri Gilad made a second trip to the Negev, met with the Bedouin, saw aerial photographs of extensive pre-1948 Bedouin agriculture, and apologized for the hasty conclusions he had drawn after touring with the right wing Regavim, he wrote that there is plenty of good will among the Bedouin and that a solution could be reached if everybody was put in one room to talk to each other. Talking to the Bedouin as equal citizens is a radical idea, but I agree. This is in fact what the Bedouin are asking: Yes, these issues must be resolved. Shelve Begin/Praver, and begin truly speaking with us.
http://rhr.org.il/eng/2013/07/three-myths-about-the-bedouin/
Scootaloo
(25,699 posts)Jefferson23
(30,099 posts)Things to do today to pump Israeli policy.
King_David
(14,851 posts)But that is all I am allowed to say.
Jefferson23
(30,099 posts)guillaumeb
(42,641 posts)would they have to also consider them to BE people? With rights? That might lead to the admission that the Palestinians are people also. Who can say where that might lead.
Little Tich
(6,171 posts)azurnoir
(45,850 posts)Little Tich
(6,171 posts)If some Israeli citizens are stripped of their basic rights by court decision just because they're Bedouin, then it's one more instance of apartheid in Israel. Israel is already very close to apartheid, and if this continues, then Israel will be an apartheid state.
King_David
(14,851 posts)when I did a search,quite the opposite actually.
Little Tich
(6,171 posts)As long as all Israeli citizens enjoy at least basic democratic right, Israel is by definition (my definition) not an apartheid state. The problem is two-fold though; I consider the political system in the West Bank to be apartheid, and I also think that the current government is trying to erode the already very basic democratic rights of some Israeli citizen due to their ethnicity, which will lead to apartheid.
For me, this distinction between Israel the democracy and the apartheid West Bank is very important, and I've always maintained that distinction. I like Israel, but I don't like where Israel is going.
Please don't mistake my criticism of the bad things going on in Israel right now for a dislike for Israel in general.