Yachad legal trip DRAFT itinerary 9th-12th November

Background The purpose of the Yachad legal trip is bring together Jewish legal practitioners on a three day programme to and the to spend time looking in depth at the legal debate surrounding the conflict. A key focus of the trip will be a trip to the military courts administered by the IDF in the West Bank. Yachad conducted its first legal trip in January 2014. If you would like to read the press coverage of the trip you can do so here: http://www.thejc.com/comment-and-debate/comment/114819/take-a-lawyers-advice-visit- occupied-territories http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/.premium-1.568790 http://www.haaretz.com/jewish-world/rabbis-round-table/.premium-1.568906

Dates The trip will take place between Sunday 9th-Wednesday 12th November 2014 inclusive, starting in the evening of Sunday 9th November. If there are participants who would like leave on Wednesday 12th November on the last flight out of (Easy Jet: 7.25pm) we can arrange for the schedule to finish in time for people to reach the airport.

Accommodation We will be staying at The Bat Moshava Hotel in West , the details of which are here: http://bit.ly/1hxdRVa

Costs The cost of the trip is £700 per person or £535 if you would like to share a room. These costs exclude flights which you are responsible for booking. The costs do not include transfer to and from the airport but all other ground costs are included.

Flights It is your responsibility to book your own flights to ensure you arrive in time for the start of the trip. If enough of the participants are on the same flights we can look into arranging transport.

Insurance It is your responsibility to ensure you have travel insurance that covers you for Israel and the West Bank. Yachad's Public Liability Insurance will cover us for the trip and we will ask you to sign an document that makes it clear we are not responsible for your travel insurance.

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Day 1 – Sunday 9th November

8.30pm Introductory Dinner

Day 2 Monday 10th November

8.30am Leave hotel in Jerusalem to travel to Tel Aviv

9.30am-11.15am Meeting with Michael Sfard, at his law offices in Tel Aviv.

Michael Sfard Biography Michael Sfard is the Israeli human rights and peace movement’s leading lawyer. As Legal Advisor for Israeli Human Rights group , and for 's Settlement Watch project, Sfard has brought scores of human rights and land-use cases challenging Israel’s occupation policies in the Palestinian territories, and has handled numerous petitions concerning the . He has also represented hundreds of soldiers refusing to serve in the occupied territories. As the Christian Science Monitor and Jewish Forward put it: “Young lawyer Michael Sfard has achieved something that the White House and left-leaning Israeli political leaders could not: His legal work on behalf of Palestinian clients is compelling Israel in at least two instances to roll back Jewish settlements.” His legal success has made him an enemy of the right: last year, an Israeli settler was indicted in connection with an Internet posting that called for his assassination. But Sfard is widely respected by judges and adversaries. Born in Jerusalem, Sfard completed his legal studies at the Hebrew University, and holds an LLM in International Human Rights Law from University College London (UCL). Sfard served in the Israeli Defense Forces as a military paramedic

Link to New York Times Profile: “A Champion for the Displaced in Israel” Jewish Daily Forward piece: “Lone lawyer battles illegal settlements”

11.15-12pm Travel into the central West Bank

12-3pm Visiting Yesh Din projects and clients (packed lunch provided to eat en-route)

Background to Yesh Din Yesh Din's activities focus on the extent of Israel's implementation of its duty to protect the Palestinian civilians under its armed forces' occupation. These include: criminal accountability of Israeli civilians and members of the Israeli security forces in the West Bank; human rights violations related to use of Palestinian lands; and respect for human rights within the Israeli Military Courts in the West Bank.

3.30-4.30pm Travel to Gush Etsion settlement bloc

4.30pm-6pm Meeting with Settler leaders from the Yesha Council

Background to the Yesha Council 2

The Yesha Council (Mo'etzet Yesha) which is the Hebrew acronym for Yehuda Shomron, Aza (Judea, Samaria and Gaza Council) is an umbrella organization of municipal councils of Jewish settlements in the West Bank (and formerly in the ), known by the Hebrew acronym Yesha. The Council was founded in the 1970s as the successor to Gush Emunim ("Block of the Faithful"), an organization formed to promote Jewish settlement in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, which they regarded as the return of Jews to their Biblical homeland. The Council consists of 25 democratically elected mayors and ten community leaders. The Council works to improve security by (for instance) by arranging the acquisition of bullet-proof ambulances and buses. The Council works with the Israeli government to provide roads, electricity, and water to the settlements. In addition to municipal and security issues, the Council serves as the political arm of the Jewish residents of Yesha. The Council lobbies for their interests with the and the government. The Council carries on public relations campaigns for the settlements and has organized several large public protests.

6-6.30pm Travel back to Jerusalem

6.30pm Rest in Hotel

7.30pm Dinner at restaurant in West Jerusalem, location TBC

Guests include: Tomer Braude, Talia Sasson, David Benjamin

Professor Tomer Braude Biography Associate Professor, Sylvan M. Cohen Chair in Law, Hebrew University of Jerusalem S.J.D., University of Toronto Faculty of Law, 2004 B.A., LL.B, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 1996

Tomer Broude joined the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in 2004 as a full-time faculty member of law and international relations after five years of commercial legal practice and receiving a doctoral degree from the University of Toronto Faculty of Law. He is currently a senior lecturer with tenure and the Sylvan M. Cohen Chair in Law at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. From 2009-2012 he was the academic director of the Minerva Center for Human Rights. In 2012-2013 he is a Visiting Professor at the University of Virginia School of Law.

Broude's research is in international public law and economic law, particularly the World Trade Organization and regional trade law, dispute settlement, investment and development, and incorporating economic and human rights perspectives. He has taught international law at Tel Aviv University, the University of Toronto, the University of British Columbia, Georgetown University Law Center, Johns Hopkins University's School of Advanced International Studies, Bocconi University, Gujarat National Law University, the Duke-Hong Kong University Asia-America Institute in Transnational Law and McGill University.

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David Benjamin Biography Lieutenant-Colonel (Reserve) David Benjamin is an Israel-based attorney specialising in International Law, the Law of Armed Conflict and Counter-Terrorism.

As a career officer in the Israel Defence Forces, Lt. Col. Benjamin served, inter alia, as the Chief Legal Advisor for the Gaza Strip (2001 - 2005) as well as Director of the International and Strategic Branch in the IDF's International Law Department (2006 – 2009). In these positions, he played a key role in providing operational legal advice to military commanders and developing legal responses to situations arising in asymmetric conflicts. He was involved in drafting the State's arguments in response to numerous petitions submitted to the Israel Supreme Court.

Now in private practice, Lt. Col. Benjamin provides consulting services to government and international organisations. He also lectures to audiences, both in Israel and abroad and is a frequent commentator in the local and international media. Lt. Col. Benjamin holds an LLM from Tel Aviv University as well as Bachelor's degrees in Law and Political Science from the University of Cape Town.

Talia Sasson Biography

Talia is an Attorney who now heads her own law firm, representing organisations in administrative and civil cases in court. She is a board member of the New Israel Fund (N.I.F.) and has been a co- chair of the International Council of the New Israel Fund since 2011. She is a board member in the Council for Peace and Security, a member of the Geneva Initiative's steering committee and Yesh Din's Public Council. In 2009, she ran for the Knesset as representative of The New Movement- Meretz.

From 2004 to 2010, Talia taught a class on 'Legal Defences on the Democratic Regime in Israel' in the faculty of law at Tel-Aviv University as adjunct professor. She worked in the State Attorney's office from 1979 to February 2004. From August 2004 to March 2005, at the request of former Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, Talia served as a special legal advisor to the prime minister on the issue of illegal outposts and in the West Bank and law enforcement on in the Palestinian territories. In that capacity, she prepared a report (known as "The Sasson Report") that was presented to the prime minister and the Israeli government in March 2005. From then until July 2005, she was a special legal advisor to the ministerial committee assigned with implementing the report's recommendations on illegal outposts. This is the link to the Sasson report: http://www.mfa.gov.il/MFA/Government/Law/Legal+Issues+and+Rulings/Summary+of+Opinion+Concernin g+Unauthorized+Outposts+-+Talya+Sason+Adv.htm

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Day 3 Tuesday 11th November

8.30am Meeting with Gerard Horton from Military Court Watch at hotel for background briefing

Background to Military Court Watch (MCW)

MCW’s work is guided by a basic principle that children detained by the Israeli military authorities are entitled to all the rights and protections guaranteed under international law. Further, and in accordance with the principle that no State is permitted to discriminate between those over whom it exercises penal jurisdiction, there is no legal justification for treating Palestinian and Israeli children differently under Israel’s military and civilian legal systems.

In accordance with these principles, MCW advocates, and where appropriate, litigates, to ensure that all children that come in contact with the military legal system are treated with equality and in accordance with the law.

Gerard Horton Biography Gerard is the founder of Military Court Watch. Previously he was a lawyer at Defence for Children International (DCI), which is an international organization working in the West Bank, Gaza and Israel in the field of promoting and defending the rights of children. Gerard has worked in the region for five years with a focus on Palestinian children detained and prosecuted in Israeli military courts.

9.15am-10am Travel to Ofer Military Base

10-12.30pm Observing legal process in Ofer Military Court

NB translators will be present

Ofer Military Court Ofer Military Court is next to the Ofer prison, both situated very close to Ramallah. Thousands of go on trial every year in the Ofer military court for offenses like illegally entering Israel or throwing stones.

12.30pm-1pm travel to Beit Ummar, eat lunch en route

1-5pm meeting with families in Beit Ummar/Al'Arrub

Background to Beit Ummar and Al’Arrub Beit Ummar is a Palestinian town located eleven kilometers northwest of in the Hebron Governorate. According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, in 2007, the town had a population of 13,348 inhabitants. Over 4,800 residents of the town are under the age of 18. Since the Second Intifada, unemployment ranges between 60 to 80 percent due mostly to the inability of residents to work in Israel and a depression in the Palestinian economy. A part of the city straddles Road 60 and due to this, several propositions of house demolition have occurred.

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Al-Arrub is a Palestinian refugee camp located in the southern West Bank along the Hebron- Jerusalem road. It is 15 kilometers south of Bethlehem and to the East of Beit Ummar. According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS), the camp's population was 7,941 in 2007.

Many of the residents of both Beit Ummar and Al Arrub have experienced the military courts and the military prisons.

5pm Travel back to Jerusalem

6-7pm Time in hotel

7.30pm Dinner at Legacy hotel with guests (see below)

Background to dinner guests: 1. Na’ama Baumgarten-Sharon – researcher at Israeli human rights organisation Btselem 2. Nery Ramati - lawyer at Gaby Lasky and partners, one of Israel’s leading human rights law firms 3. Shahrazad Odah- lawyer at Public Committee Against Torture 4. Raghad Jaraisy (TBC) – Lawyer at Association for Civil Rights in Israel working on Freedom of Protest in the Occupied Territories

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Day 4 – Wednesday 12th November

8.30am -11am Tour of East Jerusalem with Danny Seidemann

Danny Seidemann biography Daniel Seidemann MBE is Israel’s leading expert on Jerusalem and the founder of Terrestrial Jerusalem, an Israeli non-governmental organization that works to identify and track the full spectrum of developments in Jerusalem that could impact either the political process or permanent status options, destabilize the city or spark violence, or create humanitarian crises. Danny is frequently consulted by governmental bodies in Israel and the Palestinian territories and regularly briefs international governments including the Foreign and Commonwealth office in the UK and White House officials on matters pertaining to Israeli- Palestinian relations and developments in Jerusalem.

Danny has been a practicing attorney in Jerusalem and a partner in a firm specializing in commercial law since 1987. Since 1991, he has also specialized in legal and public issues in East Jerusalem. Since 1994, Danny has participated in numerous Track II talks on Jerusalem between Israelis and Palestinians. In 2000-2001, he served in an informal advisory capacity to the final status negotiations, serving as a member of a committee of experts commissioned by Prime Minister Barak's office to generate sustainable arrangements geared to implement the emerging political understandings with the Palestinians

11am-1pm Tour of East Jerusalem Neighbourhoods Silwan and Sheikh Jarrah with Moriel Rothman from Just Vision

Moriel Rothman Biography Moriel is the Program Coordinator at Just Vision, an organization that creates documentary film and multimedia tools to generate support for Palestinian and Israeli grassroots leaders. Moriel is based in Israel, where he brings Just Vision’s films and educational materials to Israeli universities, youth groups and communities to engage the Israeli public around nonviolent efforts to end the occupation and the conflict. Additionally, Moriel works with international delegations of faith leaders, community organizers, policymakers and more in order to ensure that the stories of nonviolence are recognized, noticed and understood by groups visiting the region.

Moriel is an American-Israeli writer, activist, refusenik and spoken word poet. He was born in Jerusalem, and raised in Yellow Springs, Ohio and Zikhron Ya'akov, Israel. He holds a degree in Arabic and Political Science from Middlebury College in Vermont. After graduating, Moriel moved back to Jerusalem and worked as a field activist in the Occupied Palestinian Territories with Rabbis for Human Rights. In the Fall of 2012, Moriel spent a short time in military jail for refusing to serve in the Israeli army. Since his release, Moriel has continued to be involved in on the ground activism, writing and community organizing against the occupation.

His writings have appeared in publications including Haaretz, the Huffington Post, the Daily Beast, +972 Magazine, and many more. He blogs independently at The Leftern Wall, which has been cited in sources including the Washington Post, Haaretz, Al Jazeera and more.

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1pm- 3.30pm Lunch and final brainstorm/discussion with invited guests. Location TBC

Guests Biographies 1. Connie Martinez-Varela Pedersen – International Advocacy Director for Yesh Din 2. Ra’anan Alexandrowicz – Director The Law In These Parts, documentary film about the military courts in the West Bank 3. Gerard Horton - founder of Military Court Watch (as above)

3.30pm Programme ends

3.30pm - 5pm Travel to Ben Gurion for those flying out of Israel on 7.25pm EasyJet flight (or other flights)

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