New Israeli military orders target tens of thousands of Palestinians for deportation, a rights group reported yesterday.
Two signed military orders come into force this week. They give Israeli military officials broad and almost total control over the deportation of Palestinians whose residency status in the West Bank is called into question.
Specifically, the Hamoked Centre for the Defence of the Individual alleged that the order will be used to deport residents of Gaza from the West Bank, and will likely also target foreign passport holders and non-Palestinian spouses of West Bank residents.
The centre said tens of thousands of Palestinians and West Bank residents could be caught in the net of the orders, which Israeli journalist Amira Hass said in a report yesterday were ‘expected to clamp down on protests in the West Bank.’
The new military orders, by substantively changing the definition of an ‘infiltrator’, Hamoked said in a statement ‘effectively apply (the term) to anyone who is present in the West Bank without an Israeli permit’.
The centre noted that ‘the orders do not define what Israel considers a valid permit’, and that ‘the vast majority of people now living in the West Bank have never been required to hold any sort of permit to be present therein’.
The amendments apply to a 1969 order issued following the start of the Israeli military occupation of the West Bank and Jerusalem.
The order was first amended in 1980, when an infiltrator was defined as ‘a person who entered the Area knowingly and unlawfully having been present in the east bank of the Jordan, Syria, Egypt or Lebanon following the effective date’.
In the latest order, an ‘infiltrator’ is defined as: ‘A person who entered the Area unlawfully following the effective date, or a person who is present in the Area and does not lawfully hold a permit.’
The presumption that the orders will be used to clamp-down on Palestinians participating in popular protests against land confiscation and the construction of the separation wall follows a series of failed measures by the Israeli army to stifle the increasingly broadly supported actions.
The second amendment, the Hamoked statement said, will allow the Israeli military to ‘prosecute and deport any Palestinian defined as (an) infiltrator in stark contradiction to the Geneva Convention’.
The centre noted that ‘there is a possibility that some of the deportees will not be given an opportunity for a hearing before being removed from the West Bank.’
