De mest beskrivende ordene jeg kjenner fra Israel/Palestina-konflikten, det er:
"Tilstedeværende Fraværende"
På hebraisk: "Nifkadim Nokhahim"
DA er du palestinsk flyktning i 1948, og har blitt tvunget ut av hjemmet ditt, men ikke langt, du er fortsatt i nærområdet i det som ble Israel.
Du kan kanskje se hjem, men du får ikke lov å dra dit.
Og i 1950 lovfestes din status: Du er "Tilstedeværende Fraværende":
""Tilstedeværende fraværende" (på hebraisk Nifkadim Nokhahim) refererer til palestinere som flyktet fra sine hjem under krigen i 1948, men forble innenfor det som ble staten Israel. Gjennom israelsk lovgivning, spesielt Absentee Property Law (1950), ble de juridisk definert som "fraværende", og mistet dermed retten til eiendommene sine, som ble overtatt av staten."
The disputed land, this month. The residents never left their homes or abandoned their property at any point.Credit: Amir Levi
The Absentee Property Law was enacted in 1950 to create a quick, easy
way to nationalize the vast amount of property left behind by hundreds
of thousands of Palestinian refugees when they fled or were expelled in
the Nakba. This is an extraordinary and unreasonably sweeping law. It
states that anyone who spent any time in an enemy country or “in any
part of the Land of Israel that is outside of the area of Israel” is an
absentee whose property is automatically transferred to the state, with
no compensation.
Effectively, this law is so sweeping that according to the literal
meaning of the words, any settler or soldier who lives or is stationed
in the West Bank could be defined as an absentee, since they are in a
part of the Land of Israel that is outside the State of Israel. But the
settlers obviously don’t need to worry. This law has served as a
discriminatory and destructive constitutional weapon against the Arab
population in Israel and the territories.
The latest example of this law’s destructiveness was the ruling by
Supreme Court Justices Alex Stein, Noam Sohlberg and David Mintz upholding the seizure of 7.5 acres
from residents of Taibeh. In defiance of both the spirit of the law and
its rationale, this land was seized even though Taibeh’s residents were
never refugees and in fact became Israeli citizens shortly after the
state’s establishment.
The pretext for the ruling was that for a
few months during Israel’s War of Independence, a temporary border
separated Taibeh from lands to its west which were owned by Taibeh
residents. This fact sufficed to define these lands as absentee
property, since during that brief period, Taibeh residents lived in a
part of the Land of Israel that was outside the rule of the State of
Israel.
Consequently,
in 2017, almost 70 years after the war and decades after the land had
switched hands without any problem, the state’s administrator general
suddenly remembered this fact and expropriated the property. The
justices confirmed this move, and even ordered the petitioners to pay
30,000 shekels ($9,300) in court costs.
It
must be hoped that when an expanded panel of justices holds an
additional rehearing of the case, following a request from the families,
justice will be done and the theft restored. But either way, this is
further proof of the crying injustice of the Absentee Property Law. MK
Mossi Raz (Meretz) recently submitted legislation to repeal it. Every
Knesset member with a conscience and every Israeli ought to support his
bill.
The above article is Haaretz's lead editorial, as published in the Hebrew and English newspapers in Israel.
Etter 70 år gjør Israel krav på et landområde etter lovgivningen om "Absentee Property".
"Israel Seized Land From Arab Citizens Based on Temporary 1948 Cease-fire Line"
"In
1948, a temporary border separated Arab families from their land in
Israel’s Triangle region. Several months later, the border was erased.
But in 2017, in a stunning upset of norms, Israel justified seizing the
lands under the Absentee Property Law."
"But in this case, the families neither fled their homes nor left their
property behind. To understand the absurdity of the administrator
general’s decision, it’s necessary to return to the war in 1948, when a
temporary border was drawn between Israel and Jordan. This line
separated the families from their lands for a few months in 1948-49." (Haaretz 15. mars 2022)
Det er 3 konservative dommere i Israels Høyesterett som har dømt:
"The case was heard by three conservative justices – Noam Sohlberg, Alex
Stein and David Mintz. Stein, who wrote the ruling, rejected all of the
family’s arguments."
De nåværende eierne får ikke se de kart som retten har dømt etter:
"Following the ruling, the families asked the administrator general to
see the maps of the temporary border so that they could consider their
next legal moves. Their request was rejected on the grounds that
revealing the maps could undermine the state’s foreign relations ..."
.........................
Israels Høyesterett har nå dommere som tar avgjørelser der underlagene tydeligvis ikke tåler dagens lys.
Israel Seized Land From Arab Citizens Based on Temporary 1948 Cease-fire Line
In
1948, a temporary border separated Arab families from their land in
Israel’s Triangle region. Several months later, the border was erased.
But in 2017, in a stunning upset of norms, Israel justified seizing the
lands under the Absentee Property Law
Few remember the brief period, spanning
just a few months in 1948-49, when the cease-fire line between Israel
and Jordan ran through the Little Triangle – a concentration of Arab
towns in northcentral Israel, roughly bounded by Baka al-Garbiyeh,
Taibeh and Tira.
Even
the two families from Taibeh and Kalansua that own land there would
have lived out their lives without ever remembering. That is, until they
received a Kafkaesque reminder in 2017 when the Justice Ministry’s
administrator general decided to seize the lands.
The
agency justified the seizure under the Absentee Property Law. They
argued that the owners had been absentees during those few months,
decades ago, when the border ran through the area. Even though the
families never left their homes and became Israeli citizens after the
war, the Supreme Court upheld the decision.
The
saga began in 2017, almost 70 years after the temporary border
disappeared. The landowners (who asked that their names not be
published) applied for a permit to fill in a large quarry and convert
the area to agricultural land. With the request, the administrator
general and official receiver suddenly remembered it considers the land
state-owned.
Chaim Herzog, Assaf Simhoni and a Jordanian officer during the 1948 ceasefire negotiations with Jordan.Credit: IDF Spokesperson's Unit
In
the ensuing legal battle, the families weren’t permitted to request
that the land be returned to them, contrary to the wording of the law.
Further, they were barred from seeing the maps upon which the state’s
claim was based. The battle ended with these 7.5 acres in the state’s
possession.
The
Absentee Property Law of 1950 allowed the state to seize the property
of Palestinian refugees who fled during the War of Independence. An
absentee owner was defined as anyone who spent time in territory
controlled by “forces that sought to prevent the state’s establishment”
from November 1947. It ruled that absentees’ property inside Israel
would be transferred to the administrator general. The law’s passage
enabled Israel to seize a great deal of property belonging to
Palestinians who had fled to places like Jordan, Syria and the Gaza
Strip.
But
in this case, the families neither fled their homes nor left their
property behind. To understand the absurdity of the administrator
general’s decision, it’s necessary to return to the war in 1948, when a
temporary border was drawn between Israel and Jordan. This line
separated the families from their lands for a few months in 1948-49.
But in early 1949, after the Armistice Agreement was signed, the Triangle was transferred to Israel. Its residents received Israeli citizenship, and the temporary border was erased from the maps.
In the decades since, land in the area has been transferred from hand
to hand with no problems and the administrator general never made any
effort to claim it – until 2017, when it declared that since these lands
had temporarily been on the other side of the border, it could seize
them.
The city of Taibeh. After the war, the residents became Israeli citizens.Credit: Ofer Vaknin
Following
this upset, the case took yet another unexpected turn. The Absentee
Property Law states that someone whose property was seized under the law
can appeal the decision. But the administrator general, Ronen Baruch,
refused the families’ request on the grounds that only the original
absentees could put in such a request, not someone who had purchased the
land from them.
The
families’ lawyers, Nir Raber and Yonatan Morell of the Herzog Fox &
Neeman law firm, said there’s no hint of any such provision in the law.
Moreover, the families say it’s no longer possible to locate the dozens
of heirs of the original owners in order to have them file the request
for return.
In
their petition to the High Court of Justice, the attorneys argued that a
case in which, after over 70 years, the state suddenly “remembers” to
claim land that “it does not and has never needed and that has already
been sold to buyers who paid good money for it,” and then refuses to
even let the families request its return, “is intolerable and patently
unreasonable.”
The
case was heard by three conservative justices – Noam Sohlberg, Alex
Stein and David Mintz. Stein, who wrote the ruling, rejected all of the
family’s arguments.
A meeting of the Israel-Jordan Armistice Committee at the Mandelbaum Gate, 1953.Credit: Thodore Brauner / National Pho
“It’s
clear that the land belongs to the administrator and the Development
Authority and that the petitioners have no claim against the
administrator or the state,” he wrote. The fact that the administrator
made no effort to claim the land until 2017 in no way detracts from its
right to do so, he added.
The justices even ruled that the family must pay the state 30,000 shekels ($9,100) in court fees.
Following
the ruling, the families asked the administrator general to see the
maps of the temporary border so that they could consider their next
legal moves. Their request was rejected on the grounds that revealing
the maps could undermine the state’s foreign relations – a common
pretense for refusing to divulge information.
In November,
Haaretz reported that the administrator general was fighting a freedom
of information request for a list of the assets it holds in East
Jerusalem. In that case, too, the agency said revealing the information
could undermine the state’s foreign relations. The families recently
asked the High Court to rehear their petition with an expanded panel of
justices. They are awaiting Supreme Court President Justice Esther
Hayut’s ruling on the request. In the meantime, one of the petitioners –
the land’s original purchaser – had a stroke. He died two weeks ago.
The lands that were divided by the temporary 1948 ceasefire line, earlier this month.Credit: אמיר לוי
The
Finance Ministry, speaking on the administrator general’s behalf, said
that since the issue is still in legal proceedings, it would offer its
response in court.
