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Land Defense Coalition Stop the Wall Campaign

Between August 25 and September 9 2014, the Israeli lorem ipsum dolor civil administration published is planning to forcibly relocate some 27,000 plans to build a new settlement sit amet. communities living in Area C in the occupied “Ramat Nu’eimeh” in to three 'relocation' townships in order to Inweimeh near in order to house about 12,500 prepare Area C (over 60% of the West Bank) for final Palestinian Bedouin from the annexation. Jahalin, Kaabneh and Rashaida tribes that are to be expelled from their homes and lands in the and the page 3 area east of . The area slated for the township is owned by Palestinian villages Stop and comprises 1,460 dunams. Two other 'relocation' townships are to be built: one in the area of , close to Israel's the Jerusalem rubbish dump where already some x Bedouin have been expelled to in 1997 and 2012, the other one in the northern Jordan Valley. 'Relocation'

Expulsion starts with 20 communities, comprising some 2,300 people, to be uprooted plan from the area slated for the expansion of the illegal Ma'ale Adummim settlement (E1 area) and then forcibly transferred to the site next to the Abu Dis garbage dump.

Asked if Israeli authorities plan to put the communities on trucks to 'relocate' them (as happened in 1997) Yuval Turgeman, the director of Bedouin affairs of the Civil Administration answers: “We won’t put them on trucks. But we’ll take immediate action to demolish their residences and agricultural buildings, because there is an alternative here.”

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"It's clear now that the plan is much bigger. It's not just about expanding settlements or building military zones, it's about evacuating people from this land"

(Abu Imad, Jahalin)

What is the background?

• As a result of the Oslo Agreement living in the E1 area have been in 1993 the occupied West Bank forcibly transferred to a site has ben classified into Area A approximately 150 meters from "If there are no Bedouin in this (Palestinian civil control), Area B the garbage dump in Abu Dis. In area, in between Jerusalem (mixed control) and Area C (full 2007 Israel displaced another 300 and Ma'ale Adumin and all the Israeli control). Area C comprises Bedouin families from the E1 way to Jericho, I swear that no over 60% of the West Bank and area to the township in Abu Dis. Palestinian will be able to cross much of non-residential and or enter this area without agricultural lands and water • Already in late 2011 the Civil Israeli permission", says Abu resources. Since then, Israel has Administration informed UN Imad from the Jahaleen. acted as if Area C was de facto agencies about a plan to evict annexed land, expanded further 2,300 residents of 20 settlements and military zones on Bedouin communities in the the area and developed Jerusalem district to a second site, uncountable measures to expel approximately 300 metres from the communities residing there the Jerusalem municipal garbage from their lands and homes. dump. The plan included for the first time officially the provision of • Bedouin living in Area C east of 'a permanent solution for the Jerusalem have been forcibly residence for the Bedouin removed from the lands they have population' (i.e. townships) and been living on since the start of the outlined as well expulsion plans of construction of the illegal the Bedouin communities in the settlement of Ma'ale Adumim in Jordan Valley. 1975. In 1995, 1997 and 1998 dozens of Jahalin Bedouin families

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Resistance of the Palestinian communities

• The Popular Council to Protect the Jordan Valley: In order to provide coordination and a unified voice for the people in the Jordan Valley, over the last two years the Jordan Valley Council has been created. It works to organize and represent the communities in the area. • The 'Gate to Jerusalem' protest camp: Stop the Wall Campaign, the Popular Resistance Committees and the Popular Council of the Jordan Valley have during February arranged a protest camp in Abu Dis, where the new relocation township is to be built. Israeli military has demolished their camp eleven times, fifteen people Who is affected? have been arrested, and thirty-six have been injured. The Israeli soldiers have finally succeeded in re-occupying the area but the people are • The Palestinian Bedouin are an integral part of the determined to continue the struggle. Palestinian people. Today, the majority of them live in the Naqab (Negev desert), Area C of the • Rebuilding destroyed communities: Many of the occupied Palestinian West Bank or as refugees in communities that are now to be transferred into Jordan. the townships have suffered repeated large scale demolitions in their communities or of their entire • Around 27,500 Palestinian are living in community. However, people organize the Area ‘C’ of the West Bank. 60 percent (15,000 reconstruction of their communities on the same Bedouins) live in the Jordan Valley in Area ‘C’. In spot – sometimes within weeks. total there are only 18,357 Palstinian Area C residents in the Jordan Valley. • Resilience in the face of constant attack: Communities remain steadfast in their lands even if • Around 2,800 Bedouins reside in 18 residential they have to suffer firing exercises by the military, areas in the hills to the east of Jerusalem. More settler attacks, confiscation of water or destruction than 85 per cent of them are refugees. of their services. • The large majority of the Palestinian Bedouin • Campaign to end corporate complicity: Stop the currently residing in the occupied West Bank are Wall Campaign, the Popular Resistance refugees that have been expelled between 1948- Committees and the Popular Council of the Jordan 1951 from the Naqab. Many of them have been Valley have successfully campaigned to ensure forcibly transferred a second time after the 1967 Palestinian business contracted to build the occupation of the West Bank. township in Inweimeh has pulled out of the • Of the over 200 families that were re-located to the operation. Sustained pressure needs to be put on township close to the Jerusalem garbage dump in any company directly or indirectly involved in this the 1990s, more than 85 per cent report they had ethnic cleansing scheme. to abandon their traditional livelihoods.

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April 2015 Bantustanization How does forced transfer work? The political significance of the expulsion of Palestinian Among the measures • Military 'Firing zones': communities from Area C undertaken by the Israeli 3,400 Bedouin in the Jordan

authorities and complicit Valley reside in the 18% of entities and corporations are: West Bank land that Israel The 'relocation' plan is another , a full scale has defined as military disaster for the Palestinian quest for self- • Demolitions of homes, zones for training, or 'firing determination. structures and entire zone' (little more than the communities: Between size of Area A, 17.7 %). 78 of 1988 and 2013, the Israel • In 1967 there were 350,000 living the 88 communities issued 12,570 demolition in what is now Area C. Today there are only affected by the 'firing zones' orders on homes and 150,000 left. Some Israeli politicians consider depend on herding and buildings in Area C1. Entire this number 'acceptable to integrate into the 2 farming for their livelihood . 1 villages have been razed Jewish state' . Yet, the large and geopolitically Amira Haas quotes Col. several times: The Bedouin strategic areas inhabited by the Palestinian Einav Shalev, operations village Hamsa was razed Bedouin have to be ethnically cleansed. officer of Central Command, twice in 2007, and al- as telling a Knesset meeting • In 2002 Israel started to institutionalize and Hadidiya has suffered large in 2014 that preventing literally cement the lines of annexation of scale demolitions 14 times ‘illegal’ [Palestinian] Area C on the ground by building the since 2006. construction is one of the Apartheid Wall around Areas A and B, slating • Denial of access to water main reasons the Israel I the rest for settlement expansion and and land: In 2013, 217 army has recently increased transfer of the existing communities. kilometers of irrigation its training in the Jordan • In 2005, Israel started the ‘disengagement pipes have been confiscated Valley. (Haaretz, 21.05.14) plan’, which affects all the Palestinian and seven rainwater • Denial of access to basic territories occupied in 1967. Gaza was collection ponds destroyed services and humanitarian transformed into an open-air prison and the in Area C. Some 50,000 aid: Schools, clinics and first of the Bantustans. The laboratory for the Palestinians in 151 other essential social West Bank. At the same time, the communities live on less services are regularly infrastructure construction to build the West than 20 lpcd (WHO demolished by Israeli Bank Bantustans was accelerated as well as minimum amount for occupation forces in order the expulsion of the Palestinian population “short-term survival” in to push the residents of from area C and the settlement expansion in emergency and disaster Area C out of their homes. these areas. situations). The Electricity services are International Fact-Finding • The 'relocation plan' or massive evacuation of forbidden. Even Mission on Settlements area C is combined with the closing the road humanitarian aid is being concluded that “[t]he denial from Jericho to Jerusalem for Palestinians. confiscated. Col. Einav of water is used to trigger This will isolate the south of the West Bank Shalev, operations officer of displacement, particularly in from the center-north. Similarly, in Salfit Central Command of the areas slated for settlement district, the illegal settlement of Ariel is IOF, explained in the expansion, especially since expanding across the West Bank. In this way, Knesset that this serves as these [Palestinian] Israel completes the construction of three "a punch in the right places. communities are mostly isolated Bantustans in the West Bank and the When you confiscate 10 farmers and herders who reduction of the Palestinians in the West large, white and expensive depend on water for their Bank to some 30% of the West Bank land or tents, it’s not easy. It’s not livelihoods.” 13% of historic . simple to recover.” (ibid.)

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International law and the international community

population along racial lines by cooperate in the commission of • The forcible and arbitrary the creation of separate the crime of apartheid are transfer of populations has reserves and ghettos for the subject to criminal prosecution been defined in the members of a racial group or (Article III, 1976 anti-Apartheid International Criminal Court groups' as well as 'the Convention). All states are statute as a crime against deliberate creation of obliged to condemn, suppress humanity when committed as conditions preventing the full and punish those involved in part of a widespread or development of such a group the crime of apartheid. All systematic attack against a or groups, in particular by states are obliged not to aid or civilian population. The crime of denying to members of a racial assist and to implement forcible transfer of populations group or groups basic human individually or collectively can be carried out through a rights and freedoms, including effective measures in order large range of 'coercive [...] the right to freedom of stop Israel from committing pressures' on people to flee movement and residence”. grave breaches of the IV their homes, including Geneva Convention. destruction of their homes or • Article 49 of the IV Geneva denying the community access Convention prohibits • In 2012, the UN Secretary- to schools and services. “[i]ndividual or mass forcible General has stated that the transfers... regardless of their implementation of the • Displacement of individuals motive”. Article 53 prohibits proposed 'relocation' would when undertaken on destruction of property not amount to individual and mass discriminatory grounds may justified by military necessity. forcible transfers and forced amount to persecution, another According to Article 147, evictions s, prohibited under crime against humanity. unlawful transfer and extensive international humanitarian law • Transfer of population as destruction or appropriation of and human rights law. Two implemented by Israel is a core property carried out unlawfully years later, determined part of the policies that and wantonly are grave international action is needed constitute the crime of breaches of the Convention, to stop Israel from apartheid, another crime and hence war crimes. implementing its 'relocation' against humanity. According to plan. International legal obligations: the UN Convention, apartheid • Members of organizations and policies include 'any measures agents that commit, participate including legislative measures, in, directly incite or inspire, designed to divide the directly abet, encourage or

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What you can do?

There are many different ways in which you can join the effort to stop Israel's 'relocation' plan. Among them are: ! Spread the information among your friends and the organizations you are active in. We have listed you links for further reading below. Work with the institutions, organizations and local authority to: ! Send a factfinding mission and 'local ambassadors' to the communities. ! Organize speaking tours for representatives of the Popular Council for the Protection of the Jordan Valley, host photo exhibits and panel discussions. ! Ask your local authorities to pass motions in defense of the rights of the local communities to exist and committing to 'responsible investment' and not to contract or otherwise support corporations or institutions complicit in Israeli war crimes and violations of international law. ! Ask your parliamentary representative to question government what they are doing to follow through with their obligation under international law to act in order to effectively stop Israel from continuing forced population transfer.

Land Defense Coalition – Stop the Wall Campaign: Contact Us! Web: www.stopthewall.org - email: [email protected] - Phone: +970-2971505 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/stop.the.wall.campaign - Twitter: StoptheWall

Further documentation:

Stop the Wall: Videos: Adequate Housing (Badil) • 40mins video on the history of • Working paper on forced Texts: the Jahalin population transfer (Badil) • About the Gate to Jerusalem • 5mins video on the ethnic protest camp (with various cleansing in the Jordan Valley United Nations: videos) • 5mins video on the Gate to • Case Study on Abu Imad, from Jerusalem protest camp • http://www.unrwa.org/userfiles/ the Jahalin tribe, with video) 2013052935643.pdf • Analysis of the relocation plan by Other Palestinian • UNDP: Bedouin in the OPT Jamal Juma’, StoptheWall. organizations: • Submission to the UN Permannt • Letter by Palestinian business Forum on Indigenous Issues refusing to build the Bedouin • ‘Water for one people only’ • UNOCHA factsheet on Area C townships (alHaq) vulnerability • Oral history on the Jahalin • Statement on the Right to • UNOCHA mapping of Area C