Gabriel Helou

"The map of the Hebron region used by the Israel Police excludes all the Palestinian villages and communities in the area, other than the three big cities, and omits written data about the Palestinian population ."

"Morning, noon and night, every Palestinian in Jerusalem lives and breathes the Israeli desire, which they perceive in the state’s policies, for them all to abandon the city and move abroad or to Ramallah. As residents but not citizens, they are subject to Israeli entry laws – as if they had asked to move there and not been annexed. Extended residence outside the city – for studies, work or living in the West Bank – puts them at risk of losing their Jerusalem residency status and expulsion, with the High Court's approval ."

" The new rules of engagement aim to level the playing field between police in Jerusalem and the IDF in the territories . These now allow, for example, police snipers to shoot live, yet relatively weak rounds from Ruger rifles, at anyone hurling firebombs, rocks, or launching fireworks in a manner that places lives at risk."

“ Kerem Navot nonprofit reports on how closed military zones have worked to shape the map in the settlers' favor. The original justification for the land closure procedures, which began immediately after the war in 1967, was on security grounds. However, since then, many other considerations have been added, primarily benefitting the settlement project. The bottom line is that currently nearly 1,765,000 dunams (about 436,000 acres) – nearly one-third of the land in the West Bank – is closed to the Palestinians, on the grounds that these are military zones. The justification is not entirely consistent with the reality, according to the report, in that about 78 percent of the land closed for military maneuvers is not being used for that purpose at all. The report says the rest of the land is divided between areas that the army makes frequent use of (more than one training exercise every three months – about 10 percent of the closed areas) and land for which little use is be...

67 years - day by day - have passed since Palestinians were forcibly evicted out of their homes towards unknown destinations. In no time, they found themselves living under temporary tents which became their permanent shelter for many many years ahead. They became to be known as Palestine refugees, to live in the most inhuman and miserable conditions. Nakba, known also as the 1st Arab-Israeli War, stands for the  1948 catastrophe surrounding the establishment of the State of Israel, resulting in the dispersion of Palestinians worldwide. The United Nations General Assembly Partition Plan of  1947 - UNGA Resolution 181 - caused the first Arab-Israeli war in 1948, in the wake of the exodus of British Mandate forces from Palestine on May 14, 1948. The Plan granted  the Jews in Palestine just over 56% of the area at a time when they owned less than 7% of the land and constituted approximately one-third of the population. By the end of the War, Israel contro...

“The Absentee Property Law and Its Implementation in East Jerusalem: A Legal Guide and Analysis ”

“ At the core of the outpost system lies the systemic violation of Palestinian human rights. If we had to look for a good example of the meaning of the outpost system – the unofficial settlements Israel builds in the West Bank – we could hardly expect a better one than the one supplied by the minister of defense. Recently, commenting on an appeal that — contrary to publications — we have nothing to do with, and demands the removal of the Mizpe Kramim outpost, Defense Minister Moseh Ya’alon said (Hebrew) that: “This point was built legally, with the support of the Prime Minister and the Minister of Defense. True, later someone appealed, an Israeli organization of course, a leftist organization that found some Arab who claims ownership.” Much as it painful that this is the level of understanding of a senior Israeli minister, the interesting part here is actually the part where Ya’alon talks about “some Arab claims ownership.” Because here, with some brutality, Ya’alon touches o...

“The large majority of countries, and most of the people in the world, already recognise Palestine as an independent state. Among the member states of the United Nations, for example, 135 countries – representing about 82 percent of world population – officially recognise Palestine as an independent state versus 50 countries that do not recognise the Palestinian state .”

“Deir Yassin was a small Palestinian village near Jerusalem which had made and scrupulously abided by a non-aggression agreement with the Haganah. On 9 April 1948, the Irgun and the Stern Gang launched an unprovoked attack on the village and massacred over 245 Palestinians. According to Benny Morris in Righteous Victims , entire families were killed, and reports from Jewish commanders spoke of “barbaric behavior towards the prisoners and dead”, with Palestinian villagers being paraded in Jerusalem city streets in trucks before being taken back to the village and murdered. Although the Haganah leadership condemned the operation, it served a useful purpose in their expulsion plan as its psychological effect on Palestinians was devastating. The accounts from survivors and witnesses were harrowing: “[I saw] a man shoot… my sister Salhiyeh who was nine months pregnant. Then he cut her stomach open with a butcher’s knife.” - Haleem Lei”  Source

“The French government has seen a window of opportunity, following recent elections in Israel, to get the United States on board for a renewed effort towards an Israeli-Palestinian settlement, and is preparing a draft UN Security Council resolution .”

“It is becoming increasingly risky to cover clashes and protests between Israeli security forces and Palestinian protesters in the West Bank as the number of journalists injured, in what appears to be deliberate targeting by Israeli security forces, continues to rise .”

“To make a long story short, this is a procedure that determines how long the state can take to respond to Palestinians’ requests to exit or enter the Gaza Strip. According to the procedure, requests to travel between Gaza and the West Bank are to be submitted no later than 14 workdays before the requested date of travel, and a response is to be provided five days before that date at the latest, to enable the applicant to seek legal recourse if necessary .”

“A new report - titled "The Unlawful Seizure of Palestinian Taxes: Israel's Collective Punishment of a People" and released by Al-Haq on the day that Palestine becomes a member of the ICC - documents the results of Israel's withholding of taxes paid by Palestinian individuals and businesses over three consecutive months and which should have been transferred to the Palestinian Authority (PA). The tax payments were seized by Israel in response to Palestine's accession to the ICC Statute in late December 2014 and amount to nearly three quarters of PA revenue for the period January to March 2015. This has lead to massive cuts to public sector salaries which have hit ordinary Palestinian families across the territory hard. Al-Haq's report – which also analyses the seizure of taxes from December 2012 to February 2013 in response to Palestine seeking recognition as a State at the UN – demonstrates that these acts constitute both extensive appropriation of prop...

“Presented below are a series of rare and historic photographs donated to the Institute for Palestine Studies by the Foundation for Middle East Peace. The photographs date from the early 1980’s as the rate of Israeli settlement growth on the West Bank accelerated .”

“Israel’s military occupation and control of the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and Gaza has gone on almost half a century, since it conquered those territories during the 1967 Six Day War.  While many fear Israel will become an apartheid state unless it relinquishes all or most of these occupied territories, the evidence is overwhelming that Israel created an apartheid system and became an apartheid state at the end of the 1967 war, 48 years ago .”

“On April 1 Palestine joined the International Criminal Court (ICC), which now has jurisdiction over international crimes committed on or from Palestinian territory since June 2014. On the same day, though hardly reported, the Israeli Defense Force (IDF) confiscated 12 sets of solar panels, batteries, and electric cables from an impoverished Bedouin community, Khan Al Ahmar, in the arid hills east of Jerusalem in the occupied West Bank. The residents needed the solar panels to generate their own power because Israeli military authorities refuse to allow them to connect to the electricity grid. It was the latest in a series of measures that appear designed to push the inhabitants of Khan Al Ahmar off their land. The experience of the community of Khan Al Ahmar is all too common in the occupied West Bank. But Palestine’s ICC membership should send a signal to Israel to investigate and stop such actions, and here’s why. The ICC’s Rome Statute prohibits as a war crime the tra...

“Israelis were enraged by the ‘prank’ yet somehow managed to ignore the army’s violent response of house-to-house searches, closures and arrests .”

“A better path to avoiding an Israeli confrontation with the ICC is Israel’s own legal system. Israel has an active, respected, and independent judiciary that is unique in the region .” See Article 17 of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court . 

“An hours-long search for an Israeli presumed missing in the West Bank concluded on Thursday evening when he was found alive near the town of Kiryat Arba. The case was initially being treated as a kidnapping, but the army later described the incident as a "prank." Starting in the afternoon, security forces combed the area of Beit Anun, near Hebron, where Nir Asraf, a 22-year-old resident of Be'er Sheva, was persumed missing. IDF special forces units were deployed in the area as well. Asraf's whereabouts were discovered after a friend who reported his disappearance admitted during questioning that he was lying .” “Hundreds of policemen and soldiers from the IDF's Judea and Samaria division were deployed to the area to search for Asraf, including Special Unit soldiers. The troops were searching houses and cars in Bayt Einun .”

“The Israeli High Court delivered its final decision on the Cremisan valley case this morning, Thursday the 2nd of April 2015, in favor of the petition against building the separation wall in Cremisan, after a legal battle that has started in 2006. The residents of Beit Jala whose privately owned lands were to be confiscated by building the wall appealed the Israeli Court in 2006. The Society of St. Yves later joined the appeal representing the Salesian Nuns Convent .”

“If the speaker of the House visits Israel and does not say anything substantive, does it have any effect on the troubled relations between Washington and Jerusalem ? Much ado was made in both capitals when it was discovered that Speaker John A. Boehner, Republican of Ohio, would lead a congressional delegation to Israel this week .”

" The Israeli government’s policy proves that the outposts are effectively settlements – only you’ll never hear them being called that .  Since 1996 Israel no longer officially creates new settlements. This is an international guarantee of the government. Creating a new settlement requires a government decision, and with three exceptions (the legalization of the outposts Bruchin and Rechalim, together with Nofei Nechemia, and Sansana in 2013), there has been no such decision. Effectively, however, there are about 100 unofficial settlements in the West Bank. Officially, they are illegal. Officially, there are demolition orders against all the structures within these unofficial settlements. Practically, however they get unceasing support from the government and could not exist without it. … In 2005, the Sasson Report on this outposts was presented  to the government; in its honor, we recently published a new position paper titled “Under the Radar.” Sasson already ...

"The International Criminal Court (ICC) held a ceremony on 1 April 2015 at the seat of the Court in The Hague (the Netherlands) to welcome the State of Palestine as the 123rd State Party to the Rome Statute, the ICC's founding treaty ."

“The state has asked the High Court of Justice for permission to demolish the ancient Palestinian village of Sussia and relocate its residents to Yatta, near Hebron, allowing for more archaeological work at the site. … The petition criticizes decisions made by the Civil Administration ’s planning committee to reject an alternate plan suggested by Sussia residents, stating that the relocation to Yatta is in their best interest .”

“Central Command chief Nitzan Alon signed an order applying Israel's penal code to Palestinians in the West Bank, hours before he left office earlier this week. The new order’s significance is mainly declarative. Parts of the Israeli penal code have already been adopted by military judges in the West Bank. And in general, arrest, detention and penal procedures are significantly harsher when applied to West Bank Palestinians than to Israeli citizens. However, an aspect that will not apply to the West Bank is the so-called Shai Dromi amendment enacted in 2008, which exempts a person from criminal responsibility for an “act urgently required to ward off someone who breaks into his home, business or farm.” This aspect would have let Palestinians ward off settler attacks without bearing criminal responsibility .”

I take pleasure in sharing with you some snapshots of pre-1948 Palestinian prestigious mansions in Talbiyeh, West Jerusalem. The residents of this neighbourhood all fled away in the wake of fighting which erupted in Jerusalem in 1948. All Palestinian properties were taken over by Israelis. This is one of the prominent buildings in Talbiyeh, commonly known as Villa Salameh,  which houses the residence of the Consul General of Belgium in Jerusalem. The building - rented to the Belgian Government back in 1948 - belongs to Salameh family, which, like other Arab citizens of the town, sought refuge outside Palestine. 

According to a report published in "NRG":  During an election conference held in Beit El settlement last week, Meir Mazuz, the "spiritual leader" of "Yachad Party", attacked the Israeli High Court "because it allowed an Arab judge to examine the case of Moshe Katsav and to send him to jail". Mazuz: "Is there an anti-democratic State like this that gave an Arab judge to sentence a former President to imprisonment? Is there such a place? There is no such thing. National disgrace. An Arab convicts a former President and sends him to prison." Salim Joubran was part of the three-judge panel which rejected Katsav’s appeal of his rape charges. ---------------------- "Israeli Arabs", equal citizens?

"Explore our map of  50 landmark human rights cases , each with a brief description and a link to a free article or report on the case. The cases were chosen in conjunction with the editors of the  Oxford Reports on International Law . These choices were intended to showcase the variety of international, regional, and national mechanisms and fora for adjudicating human rights claims, and the range of rights that have been recognized."