Al-Arakib after an Israeli Lands Administration ordered demolition, July 2010. (Photo: Oren Ziv/ActiveStills)
The Israel Land Administration (ILA), the powerhouse behind Jewish territorial expansion, is being challenged in Israel's high court over race and gender discrimination. Yesterday a judge gave the government agency and steward over state-owned lands 60 days to come up with an explanation as to why women and Palestinians should not be appointed to their high council.
The petition [in Hebrew] against the ILA's high council was submitted in 2010 by the Association for Civil Rights in Israel (ACRI) and Itach-Maaki: Women Lawyers for Social Justice (IM). At the time of filing the suit, all of the council's 22 members were Jewish men, and 10 are currently representatives of the Jewish National Fund (JNF).
On Tuesday, ACRI and IM issued the following press release:
The Supreme Court issued the interim decree yesterday (21 May) in a case filed by the Association for Civil Rights in Israel (ACRI) and Itach-Maaki: Women Lawyers for Social Justice. At a previous stage in the proceeding, the State proposed appointing women and Arabs as deputy members of the Israel Lands Administration (ILA) Council. In her reply, ACRI Attorney Rawia Aburabia argued that the State's proposal does not meet the legal requirements for due representation, and that standing members from these groups should also be appointed.
The State now has 60 days to explain why the Council should not appoint permanent Arab and women members in a manner ensuring due representation of these populations.
Founded in 1960, the ILA is an administrative dumping ground for territory expropriated by the Absentee Property Laws and a spillover Ottoman "dead lands" statue. In the early years of Israeli statehood, land funneled into the ILA was then strategically leased to Jewish residents, businesses, kibbutzim, and moshavim. The land transfers were then regulated by the state, making "the desert bloom" (after disenfranchising the original inhabitants) in accordance with a larger Zionist dream.
As a result of the state land confiscations the ILA now controls 93% of the territory inside of Israel's 1967-borders, of which 13% is shared with the JNF. Over the Green Line, the ILA also administers land leased to Israel’s "legal" Israeli settlements and the four "national parks" in the West Bank.
Aside from charges of discrimination in the high council, the ILA is also under fire for targeting Bedouins in cases of home demolitions. Most notably the ILA ordered 38 demolitions against the same village, al-Arakib, and authorized the aerial spraying of pesticides over their crops.
In 2011 the government also approved the ILA's Prawer Plan, a blueprint for transferring 30,000 Bedouins out of their Negev villages. For decades, the ILA has claimed ownership of the land tracks, citing a 1950s transfer of ownership to the state. At the time, tens of thousands of Bedouin residents–some with valid property titles—were rounded up and re-settled near Beersheba. The internal displacement was ordered as part of Israel's eight-year formal military occupation over its Palestinian citizens. When the internal occupation ended in 1956, Bedouin landowners had lost their land titles to the ILA vis-à-vis the Absentee Property Laws. Today, these communities in the Negev now make up the 45 "unrecognized villages" populated by 80,000 Bedouins.
In an escalation, last month the ILA's Prawer Plan was backed by a 100-officer, eviction trained, police force. The unit will begin Bedouin home demolitions this summer in order to clear the space for perspective Jewish tenants.
Israel Land Administration charged with race and gender discrimination
Pope “seen at confession”
Bear “may have defecated in forest”
RE: “Israel Land Administration charged with race and gender discrimination… At the time of filing the suit, all of the council’s 22 members were Jewish men” ~ Allison Deger
MY COMMENT: Accusing Israel of gender discrimination is a blood libel!
A blood libel!
A blood libel!
A blood libel!
FROM YNET NEWS – Rabbi Aviner: Women must not wear pants even when alone, by Neta Sela, 05/02/08
One of Religious Zionism’s most prominent leaders defines trousers as a ‘self-prohibition,’ says women ‘must dress
modestly also when alone and in the dark’
ENTIRE ARTICLE – link to ynet.co.il
P.S. ALSO SEE: Women noticeably absent from Jerusalem ads, By Nir Hasson, Haaretz, 10/21/11
Municipality officials deny change in policy, refer to several campaigns that featured images of women. Yet figures in city’s public relations industry say women have been entirely removed from public billboards and advertisements.
ENTIRE ARTICLE – link to haaretz.com
P.S. I wonder what Barbara Streisand will have to say about this. That is, if Babs can tear herself away from raising money for the IDF long enough to read about what is actually going on in Israel.
My father is a good man. He is a republican though. He will be forever. He is turning 60 soon. He is the medical director at two hospitals – among other stations and a private practice. Suffice it to say – he works a lot. I call him often and he still finds time to visit me and my sister whenever we want to see him instead of the other way around.
My sister has a better excuse since she is in HS still. I don’t but I like my parents coming to see me at my apartment.
Anyways, my point is that my dad won’t change his politics. He’s a great man though. And ironically has never really ‘behaved’ (if that makes sense) like a republican (I know stereotypes).
Meaning, he’s always been there for his kids and always supportive. Money is not happiness but it does make a lot of things in life easier to deal with and it’s precisely because my dad works so damn much and has accomplished as much as he has that I am set for life – as is my sister.
When I think about this older generation of Jews, like the working class who had to make it in America and start families and didn’t know the proper English (like Norman Finkelstein’s mom) and how to integrate into American society with the still visible antisemitism – I sympathize with their Zionism.
I do because I can see my own parents generation ethnic struggle to make it in America. The difference is that my family and my extended family is not overtly political. We simply aren’t. We are family oriented and education oriented. We are doctors mostly and that’s about it. Just boring American-Indians after that pretty much.
We have our politics sure, and some of us follow Indian politics (not me, I mean my elders) – but barely and only in passing or as an afterthought. Too busy working. Too busy playing the stock market when we probably shouldn’t or buying property in Florida even though we don’t travel much lol. Or blah blah.
I love my family so I can sympathize with the normalcy in a Jewish family then the switch that must turn on (that doesn’t exist within my family) when it comes to Israel and politics and Zionism.
This post may not belong in this thread
I saw a comment about Barbara Streisand. I immediately thought about how we perceive celebrities and then how their personal political affiliations change our perceptions or them over time.
I no longer can stand Jon Voight after having heard him refer to the Palestinian militants in Gaza as ‘barbarians’. That is not to say that these terrorists or that terrorists themselves do not behave barbarically – but, I felt his comments, taken in context with his overalls political identification and allegiances was racist in nature. It was not isolating and laser-bean specific. If it were I would not mind. I felt he was an Orientalist and an extremist – he was interviewed on Mike Huckabee’s show afterall.
Anyway, I’m babbling.
great comment cliff, really interesting. very. thank you.