Fwd: Mass Displacement Law to be legislated tomorrow.

[Yeela Raanan]

Mass Displacement Law to be legislated tomorrow.

The Prawer Law – Displacing tens of thousands of Bedouin.

By Dr. Yeela Raanan

The Prawer Law has been cooking for years, and it seems that it will be ready to be served in the very near future. Tomorrow it is being brought for first appeal to the Knesset. It has already been approved by the government. From here on it is almost only procedure…

And what is in this Prawer Law, or as it is officially called: The Bill for the Settlement of the Bedouin in the Negev, 2013. Unfortunately, it is anything but settlement.

The 45-page bill is divided into two: the first and massive part is all about the process of giving up one's land claims. The second and smaller part is about how to clear the land of Bedouin.

Sliman Abu-Obaid, one of my closest friends and a Bedouin, yesterday as we were running a family errand together asked with amazement, "They for sure understand the consequences of this bill, how can they, then, wish to legislate it?" 

I believe that the answer to this very very basic question is that currently in Israel, the State views the Arab citizens as no more than a nuisance. Therefore the Arabs must accept the breadcrumbs of citizenship and resources allowed to them by the State with thanks and silence. Thus it is possible to put into law a bill that forces at least 40,000 residents of the unrecognized villages to accept displacement, land loss and urbanization.

However, the Bedouin will not accept this plan with silence. And when the law is implemented, and the bulldozers come to erase 20 historical villages of thousands of people, there will be resistance. There will be intense and wide-spread suffering. There probably will even be loss of lives. And most likely, after a couple of years of unsuccessfully trying to bully the Bedouin into yet more ghetto-towns, the government will give up on its grand plan, but the damage done by then will be great. 

Old man by his demolished home. Bir Hadaj Aug. 2012

The Bill:

(Read at your own risk. I tried to simplify it. If it is important for you to understand the nuts and bolts – do plod ahead…)

First part: the legal process of forcing Bedouin to give up land claims.

In the 1970s the Government of Israel attempted to complete the land ownership registration that had been initiated by the Ottomans and the British Mandate. The Negev was the only land that had not yet gone through this process. In this process, all that claim that they own any part of the northern Negev land need to submit a land claim, which then needs to go through the legal process, and if there are no competing claims – then it belongs to the claimer. Thus about 10% of the Negev was claimed by Bedouins within the Negev during this process. The government decided to halt this legal process indefinitely. The Bedouin land claimers were left with a piece of paper named a "land claim". Today after different legislations and government decisions – only 5% of the Negev land remain under land claims – no more than 800,000 dunams (200,000 acres).

During the last decade the government of Israel has started a counter-claim process: the government claims that a piece of Negev land is owned by the state, and the Bedouin with the land claim needs to counter-prove his ownership. The catch is that the only acceptable evidence is a certified land registry, nulling the traditional Bedouin land ownership testimony. In all cases brought before the Israeli courts, the Bedouin lost, attesting to the unfair legal playing ground.

The Prawer law offers each Bedouin land claimer up to 50% of the land claimed in land compensation, and some minimal monetary compensation for the remaining 50% to be kept by the state. This seems more than generous. But once you delve into the stipulations, it is obvious this is a draconian law. I will explain.

The most horrible aspect of this law is that in order to receive any land compensation the person has to agree to be removed from his home, and to be re-located at a location chosen for him by the government. The person and his family must forgo their traditions, their land-based economy their community and life with their extended family. The Bill stipulates that a man must clear the land of everything – his home, his belongings, his animals, even his trees, to be eligible for this land compensation.

Demolitions Abu-Tlul. 2007.

Further, the person giving up the land claim will not know to where he and his family will be moved, nor where the land given in compensation will be located.

As the stipulations presented here are impossible to adhere to, most people that join this process eventually will not see any compensation for forgoing their land claim.

Further, not only is this person expected to give up his land claim in order to be deserving of the 50% land compensation, also all his siblings and cousins – the descendants of the original land claimer – must come together to forgo their land claim. If less than 50% of the descendants of the original land claimer are willing to accept this process – then the land compensation is reduced to 20%. This same level of land compensation – 20% - for forgoing the land claim, has been offered by the government for the past 30 years, and has not been accepted by the land claimers. This conditioned compensation is to create family pressure on members of the family to give up their land claim. It will indeed create family pressure – and family feuding – and all for the need of the government to get another couple of people into this proposed process.

Further, a person has to show that the land he is claiming was being used by his family in 1970, and has been in continual use until today if he wants any land compensation for his land claim. This automatically means that about half land claims will not be eligible for land compensation, as they had been removed from the land by the government in the 1950s.

And – within five years, anyone who had chosen not to enter in the process of redeeming the land claims – their land claims are automatically nulled.

Demonstration in Tel Aviv. May 2010

It sounds complicated – and it is. However, I laid it out for you so that you will know that people who claim that this is an amazing bill either don't know the facts or are in fact lying.

And why should the government bother with such an elaborate plan to allow under these difficult conditions a certain amount of land compensation? This is because, while the government of Israel does not see reason to accept the Bedouin land laws, the Bedouin do. Thus, as long as a Bedouin has not officially given up his land, no other Bedouin will move onto this land. Convincing the Bedouin to forgo their land claims cleans up the land ownership issues and allows for dense urban planning. 

And now the second part of the Bill – evacuation procedures.

1. The prime minister claims a certain area for un-settling.
   
2. A government official gives a decree for all to clear the land. There is no need for a court authorization (as is law today).
   
3. People have 30 days to clear off this area, including breaking down their homes and clearing the land.
   
4. Those who don't can be jailed for up to two years.
   
5. The courts cannot intervene, beyond procedural issues, and cannot stop a home from being demolished under this decree.
   
6. There will be billions of shekels available for this bill: police, bulldozers, whatever it takes.

That's it. There is no mention of where the people are expected to go; there is no mention of under what circumstances a village will be recognized. There is no mention of planning procedures. There is no mention of the government's responsibility towards the tens of thousands that it is going to make homeless by this bill.

And this is the Prawer Bill to be voted on in the Knesset tomorrow.

It is a really dark day for Israel.

For more information: Dr. Yeela Raanan, yally...@gmail.com, +972 54 748 7005

More information can be found on

·         The Negev Coexistence Forum website:  http://www.dukium.org/eng/

·         Rabbis for Human Rights website:  http://rhr.org.il/eng/category/bedouin-rights/

·         Association for Civil Rights in Israel website:  http://www.acri.org.il/en/2013/05/06/ministers-begin-bill/

We call on the Government of Israel to recognize all the unrecognized Bedouin villages, and to act in accordance to the values of equality and human dignity.