West Bank barrier - Misplaced Pages

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File:Israelwall.jpg

A section of the "Israeli West Bank barrier" between Qalqiliyia and the nearby Israeli highway. This section of the barrier is on the Green-line border between Israel and the Palestinian west bank.

The Israeli West Bank barrier (also called West Bank Security Fence, West Bank wall, or the Apartheid Wall by critics) is a physical barrier consisting of a network of fences, walls, and trenches, which is being constructed by Israel. The barrier in part approximately follows the 1949 Jordanian-Israeli armistice line (the "green line"). In some areas the route diverges from the armistice line, particularly in the area of Israeli population centers: Jerusalem, Ariel, Beitar Illit, Efrat, Gush Etzion, and Maale Adumim. These divergences may be as much as 20 kilometers in distance. In many of these areas, the final route of the barrier has not been decided (as of April 2004). Four routes under consideration are indicated in Foreign Affairs article cited below.

The name of the barrier is itself a political issue. The most common names used by Israel are separation fence (gader ha'hafrada) in Hebrew and "security fence" or "anti-terrorist fence" in English, with "seam zone" referring to the land surrounding the fence. Opponents prefer to call it a "wall", with "Apartheid wall" being a common derogatory name for it.

There is already a similar barrier, the Israeli Gaza Strip barrier, inside the Gaza Strip parallel to the border with Israel.

History and Purpose

Physical barriers between Israeli and the Palestinians were first proposed by Yitzhak Rabin in October 1994 "We have to decide upon separation as a philosophy. There has to be a clear border. Without demarcating the lines, whoever wants to swallow 1.8 million Arabs will just bring greater support for Hamas." page 52 To this end, the government of Yitzhak Rabin built the Israeli Gaza Strip barrier in 1994. In early 1995, the Shahal commission, was established by Yitzhak Rabin, to discuss how to implement a barrier separating Israelis and Palestinians. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak, prior to the Camp David 2000 Summit with Yasser Arafat vowed to build a separation barrier stating that it is "essential to the Palestinian nation in order to foster its national identity and independence without being dependent on the State of Israel". page 54

Although at the beginning the Israeli government of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon was hesitant to construct, it finally embraced the plan, as predicted by the previous Prime Minister Ehud Barak referring to suicide bombings in February 2001: "When there are 70 dead Israelis, you can resist the fence, but when there are 700 dead Israelis you will not be able to resist it." page 54 One purpose of the barrier is to prevent terrorists from entering Israeli cities, a problem which has plagued Israel since the start of the Al-Aqsa Intifada. A secondary purpose of the barrier is to prevent illegal infilitrations by Palestinians, mainly illegal immigrants and car thieves. The Israeli Government says that the high concrete portions are to protect cars and people on the Israeli side from gunfire.

Structure and Timeline

West Bank map
The West Bank, showing the existing and the most extreme proposal of the Israeli West Bank barrier (end of 2003)

Most of the barrier consists of a wire fence with an exclusion area on each side, often including an anti-vehicle trench. Some sections, in length under 5% of the total, consist of a concrete wall up to 8 meters (25 feet) high, such as near Qalqiliya and Jerusalem. In all cases there are regular observation posts, automated sensing devices and other apparatus. There are gates at various places which are controlled by Israeli soldiers when they are not closed.

The total length of the fence (as officially authorized by the end of 2003) will be 650 kilometers (403 miles).

As of November 2003, the barrier extends inside most of the north-western and western edges of the West Bank, sometimes close to the 1949 armistice line between Israel and Jordan (the "green line"), and sometimes running further east. In some places there are also secondary barriers, creating a number of enclaves completely enclosed by barriers. It is not known whether a decision has been made to build a barrier also on the eastern side of the main regions of Palestinian population. Depending mostly on this decision, somewhere between 6% and 45% of the West Bank will eventually be outside the barrier.

In October 2003, the region between the barrier and the "green line" was declared a special military area. Although all Israelis and all Jews regardless of nationality can enter the region freely, Palestinians can enter only with special permits even if they are residents of one of the dozen or so Arab villages in the region. Many of the latter Arabs who tried to obtain permits were refused them.

In February 2004, Israel said it would review the route of the barrier in response to US and Palestinian concerns. In particular, Israeli cabinet members said modifications would be made to reduce the number of checkpoints Palestinians had to cross, and especially to reduce Palestinian hardship in areas such as Qalqilya where the barrier goes very near, and in some cases nearly encircles, populated areas.

On June 30, 2004, the Supreme Court of Israel ruled that a portion of the barrier near Jerusalem violates the rights of Palestinians, and ordered 30 km of existing and planned barrier to be rerouted. However, it did rule that the barrier is legal in essence and accepted Israel's claim that it is a security measure. On July 9, 2004, the International Court of Justice ruled that the barrier and its associated regime is a violation of international law.

Effectiveness

Israeli officers, including the head of the Shin Bet, quoted in the newspaper Maariv, have claimed that in the areas where the barrier was complete, the number of hostile infilitrations has decreased to almost zero. Maariv also stated that Palestinian militants, including a senior member of Islamic Jihad, had confirmed that the barrier made it much harder to conduct attacks inside Israel. Since the completion of the fence in the area of Tulkarem and Qalqiliya in June 2003, there have been no successful attacks from those areas, all attacks have been intercepted or the suicide bombers have detonated prematurely. page 56

In the Gaza Strip, which is surrounded completely by a fence, there have been almost no infilitrations of suicide bombers into the nearby cities Ashkelon and Sderot or into the Kibbutz Nahal Oz. Palestinian suicide bomb attacks are now being directed at checkpoints in the fence that provide access to Israel and the Erez Industrial Zone. This change of focus of the attacks is presumably because other potential targets cannot be reached because of the barrier.

According to Lt. Col. Dotan Razili of the Israeli Defense Forces barriers of this type are highly effective as "there have been almost no penetrations through the Gaza fence since 1996". (paraphrase from The Lehrer News Hour of Public Broadcasting System February 9, 2004)

Between August 2003 and July 2004, only three suicide bombers have launched attacks resulting in deaths or injuries from areas where the fence has been completed. In constrast, from September 2002 till August 2003, terrorists from these areas succeeded in carrying out 73 attacks, in which 293 Israelis were killed and 1,950 were wounded. The decrease in casualties was not due to a decrease in attempted terrorist attacks, from August 2003 to July 2004 Israeli security forces claim to have prevented dozens of planned attacks in the final stages of their implementation and uncovered 24 explosive belts and charges intended to be used for these attacks.

Col. (res.) Shaul Arieli, who was the last commander of the Gaza regional brigade of the IDF, says that the effectiveness of the barrier is only short-term. "The fence provides a partial security response to the terror threats and a good response to prevention of illegal immigration and prevention of criminal acts," he explains, "but on the other hand, in its current format it creates the future terror infrastructure because this terror infrastructure is precisely those people living in enclaves who will support acts of terror as the only possible tool that they perceive as being able to restore them the land, production sources and water wells taken from them." Arieli also said that the barrier is designed to induce the Arabs of the border region to leave so that Israel can expand. (Haaretz, February 18, 2004)

International aspects

In October 2003, the United States vetoed a United Nations Security Council resolution stating:

The construction by Israel, the occupying power, of a wall in the Occupied Territories departing from the armistice line of 1949 is illegal under relevant provisions of international law and must be ceased and reversed.

The United Kingdom, Germany, Bulgaria and Cameroon abstained from the vote. The justification given by the U.S. for the veto was that the resolution did not condemn terrorist attacks made by Palestinian groups.

One week later, a similar resolution was passed by the UN General Assembly 144-4 with 12 abstentions. The resolution said the barrier was "in contradiction to international law," and demanded that Israel "stop and reverse" its construction. Israel called the resolution a "farce".

Israeli Supreme Court decisions

The Israeli High Court of Justice has heard several petitions related to the barrier, sometimes issuing temporary injunctions or setting limits on related Israeli activities.

The most important case was a petition brought in February, 2004 by Beit Sourik Village Council, and responded to by the Government of Israel and the Commander of the IDF Forces in the West Bank, concerning a 40 km stretch of existing and planned barrier near Jerusalem. Several other persons and organizations also made submissions. After a number of hearings, judgment was made on June 30. The court noted that both the petitioners and the respondants accepted that the West Bank was held by Israel in a state of "belligerent occupation" and from this the court inferred that, in addition to Israeli administrative law, related International Law including the Hague Conventions and the Fourth Geneva Convention applied.

The first claim made by the petitioners was that construction of the barrier was itself illegal. The court ruled that construction of the barrier for security reasons would be legal, even though it would be illegal for political, economic or social purposes. Since the court accepted the respondant's argument that the part of the barrier under discussion was designed for security purposes, this claim of the petitioners was lost.

The second claim made by the petitioners was that the route of the barrier in the Jerusalem region illegally infringed on the rights of the Palestinian inhabitants. In this case the court ruled that the existing and planned route failed the principle of "proportionality" in both Israeli and international law: that harm caused to an occupied population must be in proportion to the security benefits. On the contrary, the court listed ways in which the barrier route "injures the local inhabitants in a severe and acute way, while violating their rights under humanitarian international law". Accordingly the court ordered that a 30 km portion of the existing and planned barrier must be rerouted.

Although many in the Israeli government and security establishment reacted with anger to the court's ruling, the public reaction of the government was one of satisfaction that the court had considered the barrier legal in principle. Prime Minister Sharon promised that the court's order would be followed.

International Court of Justice ruling

In December 2003, the General Assembly passed a resolution requesting the International Court of Justice to make an advisory (non-binding) ruling on the "legal consequences arising" from the construction of the barrier. The hearings began in February 2004. The Palestinian Authority is not a member of the court but was allowed to make a submission by virtue of being a UN observer and a co-sponsor of the General Assembly resolution. In January 2004, the court also authorized the League of Arab States and the Organization of the Islamic Conference to make submissions.

Israel initially announced that it would cooperate with the court, while noting that advisory rulings of the ICJ are not binding. Israel later made a written submission to the court rejecting the authority of the court to rule on the case, but announced (on February 12, 2004) that it would not appear at the court to make oral submissions. Twenty countries, including the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia and France, have expressed the opinion that the problem should be solved by political rather than judicial means. By the deadline for written submissions, 44 member states of the United Nations had made submissions in addition to the Palestinian Authority and the two organizations mentioned above.

On January 30, 2004, Israel announced officially it did not recognize ICJ authority to rule over the barrier issue. Israel also dispatched a 120 page document, elaborating on the security needs to build the "terror prevention fence" and purporting to demonstrate the atrocities committed by Palestinian terrorists. The document also included a judicial part with legal accounts supporting Israel's claim that the issue of the barrier is political and not in the ICJ authority.

On 23, 24 and 25 February 2004 the hearings before the International Court of Justice took place in the Peace Palace at the Hague. The ICJ delivered its advisory ruling on July 9, 2004.

On July 9, 2004, the International Court of Justice ruled against the barrier, calling for it to be removed and the Arab residents to be compensated for any damage done. The Court advised that the United Nations General Assembly, which had asked for the ruling, and the Security Council should act on the issue.

The ICJ decisions were as follows.

The construction of the wall being built by Israel, the occupying Power, in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including in and around East Jerusalem, and its associated régime, are contrary to international law;
Israel is under an obligation to terminate its breaches of international law; it is under an obligation to cease forthwith the works of construction of the wall being built in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including in and around East Jerusalem, to dismantle forthwith the structure therein situated, and to repeal or render ineffective forthwith all legislative and regulatory acts relating thereto, in accordance with paragraph 151 of this Opinion;
Israel is under an obligation to make reparation for all damage caused by the construction of the wall in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including in and around East Jerusalem;
All States are under an obligation not to recognize the illegal situation resulting from the construction of the wall and not to render aid or assistance in maintaining the situation created by such construction; all States parties to the Fourth Geneva Convention relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War of 12 August 1949 have in addition the obligation, while respecting the United Nations Charter and international law, to ensure compliance by Israel with international humanitarian law as embodied in that Convention;
The United Nations, and especially the General Assembly and the Security Council, should consider what further action is required to bring to an end the illegal situation resulting from the construction of the wall and the associated régime, taking due account of the present Advisory Opinion.

The decisions were passed 14-1 by the court judges, except for the 4th decision which was passed 13-2.

Palestinian leaders expressed satisfaction about the ICJ ruling.

Israel rejected the ICJ ruling and emphasized the barrier's self-defense aspect , and stressed that Israel will continue to build the barrier. The USA also rejected the ruling, declaring that the issue was of political rather than legal nature.

Senior Israeli politician Shimon Peres said "The court ignored the fact that the right to live is a basic human right. The effectiveness of the tribunal is in its ability to rule against terror, and not only against those who fight it." Israeli President Moshe Katzav dismissed the ICJ ruling as "biased" and Yossef Lapid said that it was fixed and therefore expected from the beginning.

Opinions on the barrier

Israeli public opinion has been very strongly in favor of the barrier, partly in the hope that it will improve security and partly in the belief (denied by the government) that the barrier marks the eventual border of a Palestinian state. Due to the latter possibility, the settler movement opposes the barrier, although this opposition has waned since it became clear the barrier would be diverted to the east of major Israeli settlements such as Ariel. The majority of the Israeli public holds that the barrier legitimacy comes from Israel's right to self defense.

The Palestinian population and its leadership are essentially unanimous in opposing the barrier, though some have said they would not oppose a barrier along the Green Line. They say that a large number of Palestinians have been separated from their lands or their places of work or study, that many more will be as the barriers near Jerusalem are completed, and that Palestinian institutions in Abu Dis will be prevented from providing services to East Jerusalem residents. The major Israeli human rights organizations, and many international aid organizations that work in the occupied territories, have claimed that the barrier has caused severe disruption to the lives of many Palestinians. The Israeli Defense Ministry maintains that every effort is made to minimize this disruption.

More broadly, Palestinian spokespeople, supported by many in the Israeli left wing and other organizations, claim the barrier will breed further discontent amongst the affected population and add to the security problem rather than solving it.

The Palestinian leadership fears that the barrier will become the de facto border between an enlarged Israel and a future Palestinian state.

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said on February 18, 2004:

The ICRC has repeatedly condemned deliberate attacks against Israeli civilians and stressed that all acts intended to spread terror among the civilian population are in clear violation of international humanitarian law (IHL). It recognizes Israel's right to take measures to ensure the security of its population. However, these measures must respect the relevant rules of IHL.

The ICRC's opinion is that the West Bank Barrier, in as far as its route deviates from the "Green Line" into occupied territory, is contrary to IHL. The problems affecting the Palestinian population in their daily lives clearly demonstrate that it runs counter to Israel's obligation under IHL to ensure the humane treatment and well-being of the civilian population living under its occupation.