Adalah: Escalating Annexation Measures Led by Netanyahu Government Require Urgent Intervention of International Community and Tribunals
In a new position paper, Adalah analyzes a series of recent measures by the current Israeli government which constitute annexation of the West Bank and a clear policy to extend the regime of Jewish supremacy and deepen the apartheid in the West Bank that has been established for generations.
Today, 8 June 2023, Adalah – The Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel published its position paper, The Acceleration of the Annexation of the West Bank under the 37th Israeli Government led by Prime Minister Netanyahu.
The position paper encompasses a legal analysis of measures taken to move towards annexation since the latest iteration of the Netanyahu government was seated in December 2022.
In its December 2022 coalition agreements and guiding principles, the new government pledged to increase Jewish settlements and development across the West Bank and to ultimately implement Israeli sovereignty across all of the West Bank.
CLICK HERE to read the position paper in English
CLICK HERE to read Adalah’s analysis of the coalition agreements
This position paper analyzes several of the Israeli government’s grave actions to annex the West Bank. These include: Institutional changes and transfer of spheres of operation to government offices; Legalization of outposts and expansion of settlements; and Direct application of Israeli domestic law in the occupied West Bank. The position paper also includes Adalah’s legal appeals to the Israeli authorities in regard to these actions and responses it received from officials. These responses show the government’s explicit, open and official intention to continue to perpetuate Israel’s control of the West Bank and to apply Israeli law to it, contrary to the provisions of international law, while completely denying the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination.
These include a letter from the Government Secretary, stating that “Judea and Samaria are the cradle of the history for the Jewish people and were liberated in 1967 in a defensive war against the aggression of the Jordanian occupation, which illegally held these areas since 1948,” and bases its justification for holding these territories on the claim that they were designated for a Jewish state by the League of Nations at the San Remo Conference held after the First World War in 1920.
As Adalah’s report concludes, these alarming measures constitute de facto and de jure annexation of the West Bank and are gross violations of international law. Taken together, these decisions constitute war crimes, a crime of aggression, and crime against humanity (apartheid) under the Rome Statute, as well as a deepening of the apartheid system that already exists. These measures will also have a direct impact on the question that is currently pending before the International Court of Justice (ICJ), regarding the legal consequences of Israel’s policies in the OPT and the International Criminal Court, which is currently conducting an investigation into the commission of war crimes by Israel.
Adalah’s Legal Director, Dr. Suhad Bishara, stated:
“These measures are part of an unequivocal program by the government of Israel to annex parts of the West Bank and institute full Israeli sovereignty over the land. This is an attempt to wholly erase the right of the Palestinian People to self-determination and bypass Palestinians’ rights under international law. We urge the international community to not look away from these flagrant violations of international law and to take immediate action against these measures.”
This report is also available in Arabic and in Hebrew.
Related Press Releases:
Israeli Govt. Advances Bill to Expand the Scope of the Admission Committees’ Law 4 June 2023
Israeli Cabinet Empowers Negev and Galilee Ministry to Promote Outpost “Legalization” in Occupied West Bank 14 March 2023
Adalah: New Israeli Government’s Policy Guidelines Indicate Officials’ Intent to Commit Crimes under Intl. Law 10 January 2023
Ray Hanania is an award winning political and humor columnist who analyzes American and Middle East politics, and life in general. He is an author of several books.
Hanania covered Chicago Politics and Chicago City Hall from 1976 through 1992 at the Daily Southtown and the Chicago Sun-Times. He began writing in 1975 publishing The Middle Eastern Voice newspaper in Chicago (1975-1977). He later published “The National Arab American Times” newspaper (2004-2007).
Hanania writes weekly columns on Middle East and American Arab issues as Special US Correspondent for the Arab News ArabNews.com, at TheArabDailyNews.com, and at SuburbanChicagoland.com. He has published weekly columns in the Jerusalem Post newspaper, YNetNews.com, Newsday, the Orlando Sentinel, Houston Chronical, and Arlington Heights Daily Herald.
Hanania is the recipient of four (4) Chicago Headline Club “Peter Lisagor Awards” for Column writing. In November 2006, he was named “Best Ethnic American Columnist” by the New American Media. In 2009, Hanania received the prestigious Sigma Delta Chi Award for Writing from the Society of Professional Journalists. He is the recipient of the MT Mehdi Courage in Journalism Award. He was honored for his writing skills with two (2) Chicago Stick-o-Type awards from the Chicago Newspaper Guild. In 1990, Hanania was nominated by the Chicago Sun-Times editors for a Pulitzer Prize for his four-part series on the Palestinian Intifada.
His writings have also been honored by two national Awards from ADC for his writing, and from the National Arab American Journalists Association.
Hanania is the US Special Correspondent for the Arab News Newspaper, covering Middle East and Arab American issues. He writes for the Southwest News newspaper group writing on mainstream American issues.
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