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Razing Rafah: Mass Home Demolitions in the Gaza Strip

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Razing Rafah: Mass Home Demolitions in the Gaza Strip Human Rights Watch October 2004 Razing Rafah: Mass Home Demolitions in the Gaza Strip I. SUMMARY................................................................................................................................ 1 A Pattern in the Rubble ........................................................................................................... 3 Tunnels................................................................................................................................... 3 Protecting the Border...........................................................................................................5 Rampage in Rafah: May 2004.................................................................................................. 8 Doctrines of Destruction.......................................................................................................11 Nowhere to Turn....................................................................................................................14 Methodology............................................................................................................................14 II. RECOMMENDATIONS.................................................................................................... 15 III. BACKGROUND ................................................................................................................19 Map 1: Gaza Overview............................................................................................................... 20 The Uprising in Gaza: From Closure to “Disengagement”.............................................22 Map 2: Rafah Features................................................................................................................ 26 Rafah.........................................................................................................................................26 Mass Demolition: Security Rationales, Demographic Subtexts.......................................28 IV. THE SECURITY SITUATION IN RAFAH................................................................. 32 The IDF and Palestinian Armed Groups............................................................................33 Fighting on the Border...........................................................................................................35 Smuggling Tunnels in Rafah .................................................................................................38 An Overview ....................................................................................................................... 39 Tunnels vs. Shafts............................................................................................................... 42 Destruction Around Inoperative Tunnels ...................................................................... 44 Alternatives to House Destruction .................................................................................. 48 V. THE RAFAH BUFFER ZONE SINCE 2000................................................................. 52 The Expanding Buffer Zone.................................................................................................52 Map 3: Buffer Zone Expansion................................................................................................ 54 New Realities: Widening the Buffer Zone..........................................................................55 Map 4 : Existing and Proposed Buffer Zones........................................................................ 59 Impact of Destruction............................................................................................................59 VI. A VIOLENT SEASON: DESTRUCTION IN RAFAH, MAY 2004 ....................... 62 Rampage in Rafah: An Overview.........................................................................................63 Map 5 : IDF Operations in Rafah May 2004.......................................................................... 63 Rafah Incursions by Neighborhood, May 12-24................................................................71 Block O & Qishta (evening May 12-morning May 15)................................................. 71 Map 6 : Tel al-Sultan 2004 ......................................................................................................... 75 Tel al-Sultan (May 18-May 24).......................................................................................... 75 Map 7: Brazil Features................................................................................................................ 84 Brazil and Salam (evening May 19-morning May 24) ................................................... 84 Tactics of Destruction............................................................................................................90 Home Demolitions to Enhance Mobility ....................................................................... 91 Map 8: Brazil Destruction During Operation Rainbow........................................................ 91 Infrastructure Destruction ................................................................................................ 92 Map 9: Razing of Agriculture ....................................................................................................94 Razing Agricultural Land................................................................................................... 94 VII. ROLE OF THE INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY ............................................. 95 Paying for the Mess ................................................................................................................96 VIII. PROPERTY DESTRUCTION UNDER INTERNATIONAL AND ISRAELI LAW..........................................................................................................................100 International Humanitarian Law ........................................................................................100 Responsibilities of an Occupier: Military Operations vs. Security Measures ..........101 Destruction of Property in Occupation: Military Operations and Absolute Necessity ............................................................................................................................103 Control of Property in Occupation: Security Measures and Rights..........................107 Human Rights Law and Occupied Territories .................................................................108 Forced Evictions and the Right to Adequate Housing...............................................109 Right to Effective Remedies ...........................................................................................111 Israeli Jurisprudence and Law.............................................................................................112 Exceptions Over the Rule: Israeli Courts and Destruction of Property..................112 Reparations........................................................................................................................114 IX. Appendix: Statements by International Community Condemning Destruction in Rafah.................................................................................................................116 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ..................................................................................................118 I. SUMMARY These houses should have been demolished and evacuated a long time ago … Three hundred meters of the Strip along the two sides of the border must be evacuated … Three hundred meters, no matter how many houses, period. Major-General Yom-Tov Samiya, former head of IDF Southern Command1 I built homes for Israelis for 13 years. I never thought the day would come when they’d destroy my house. … They destroyed the future. How can I start all over now? Isbah al-Tayour, Rafah resident, former construction worker in Israel2 Over the past four years, the Israeli military has demolished over 2,500 Palestinian houses in the occupied Gaza Strip.3 Nearly two-thirds of these homes were in Rafah, a densely populated refugee camp and city at the southern end of the Gaza Strip on the border with Egypt. Sixteen thousand people – more than ten percent of Rafah’s population – have lost their homes, most of them refugees, many of whom were dispossessed for a second or third time.4 As satellite images in this report show, most of the destruction in Rafah occurred along the Israeli-controlled border between the Gaza Strip and Egypt. During regular nighttime raids and with little or no warning, Israeli forces used armored Caterpillar D9 bulldozers to raze blocks of homes at the edge of the camp, incrementally expanding a “buffer zone” that is currently up to three hundred meters wide. The pattern of destruction strongly suggests that Israeli forces demolished homes wholesale, regardless of whether they posed a specific threat, in violation of international law. In most of the cases Human Rights Watch found the destruction was carried out in the absence of military necessity. 1 Voice of Israel Radio, January 16, 2002, cited in B’tselem, Policy of Destruction: House Demolitions and Destruction of Agricultural Land in the Gaza Strip, February 2002. 2 Tsadok Yehezkeli, “Regards from Hell,” Yediot Ahronoth, June 11, 2004 (Hebrew). 3 Unless otherwise stated, statistics for homes demolished and persons rendered homeless were provided by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) based mostly on assessments
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