Occupied Jerusalem- On November 11, Israeli Member of the Knesset Yitzhak Crozier from the “Jewish Power” party – led by extremist National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir – presented a draft law that he presented to the Speaker of the Knesset and his deputies, restricting and prohibiting the activities of the Palestinian National Authority and the Palestine Liberation Organization, The Fatah movement is within the borders of the Israeli occupation state, including East Jerusalem.
Tel Aviv Tribune Net viewed the text of the submitted law, which was officially published on the Israeli Knesset website, in which Crozier said that the Palestinian side did not adhere to the law issued after the Oslo Accords in 1994, which limited the operations of the Palestinian Authority to its territories, and prevented activity of a political or governmental nature within The borders of the State of Israel, such as operating a representative office or holding a political meeting.
The new draft law said that the Palestinian Authority – in East Jerusalem – established a Ministry for Jerusalem Affairs, arrested those involved in selling lands to Jews (residents of Jerusalem), issued permits for some real estate transactions, participated in the education system, and paid salaries to the families of prisoners from Jerusalem.
With the aim of strengthening the occupation’s sovereignty in the suburbs of Jerusalem, extremist Knesset member Yitzhak Kruiz presents a draft law to restrict the activities of the Palestinian Authority, the PLO, and the Fatah movement in the city of Jerusalem and its suburbs, including towns and camps.
This draft law, which has not yet been approved, gives powers to the Minister of National Security… pic.twitter.com/lMb3cUf4xY
– Jerusalem Compass (@alqudsalbawsala) November 15, 2024
High prison sentences
Since 1994, the occupation has been fighting and restricting these activities in East Jerusalem specifically (the part occupied after the 1967 war), but what is new in this draft law is the imposition of a high prison sentence, and granting Ben Gvir full powers to punish violators, according to the expression of the law.
Crozier adds, “There is an explicit prohibition in the previous law, but there is no specific punishment, which makes it a dead letter. Therefore, I propose imposing a 5-year prison sentence if the agreement was violated and offices were opened and operated within the State of Israel, and a 10-year prison sentence for whoever uses incitement.” Or violence or threats.”
The most prominent manifestations of the fight against the occupation were the activities of the Palestinian Authority in East Jerusalem, during the past two decades, in the closure of the Orient House in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood in August 2001, which was founded in 1983 and served as an unofficial headquarters for the Palestine Liberation Organization, as it was closed under the pretext of its management by the Authority.
In November 2019, the occupation issued a decision to ban the activities of Palestine TV in Jerusalem for a period of 6 months, which has been renewed until today, claiming that it is run by the Palestinian Authority. It also closed the TV office in East Jerusalem, and pursued its workers through arrest and summons for investigation.
In May 2023, a preliminary reading was approved for a law prohibiting the collective raising of the Palestinian flag in public places, after it was prohibited from being raised in institutions supported by the occupation government, and the penalty for raising it reached imprisonment for a year, which falls under the prohibition of any manifestation of Palestinian sovereignty in occupied East Jerusalem.
In addition, in East Jerusalem as well, the occupation closed cultural, educational and health associations, suppressed national celebrations such as commemorating the Nakba and Land Day, targeted Jerusalemite members of the Legislative Council and the former Minister of Jerusalem with arrest and final deportation after the 2006 Legislative Council elections, and targeted the current governor of Jerusalem, Adnan Ghaith. By arrest, deportation, summons, and home detention.
Pursuing the governor
Regarding the prosecution of the Governor of Jerusalem, the official spokesman for the Jerusalem Governorate, Marouf Al-Rifai, told Tel Aviv Tribune Net that Governor Adnan Ghaith “is removed from his workplace in the town of Al-Ram, north of Jerusalem, and the occupation has been obstructing the performance of his work since he assumed his duties in 2018, as he was affected by 5 military decisions, the last of which was Home detention has continued for two years in his home in Silwan.”
Al-Rifai added that the secretary of the Fatah movement in Jerusalem, Shadi Mutawer, has been deported from the West Bank for 5 years, banned from traveling, and some members of his family were cut off from the right to reside in Jerusalem and benefit from what is known as national insurance.
Marouf believes that the latest draft law comes in light of the international community’s preoccupation with the war on Gaza and Lebanon, “as the occupation is racing against time to impose more control over Jerusalem, inside and outside the apartheid wall, change the legal status there, and consider both parts of it as its capital.”
He added, “The Netanyahu government fired the coup de grace on what is known as the two-state solution. There are recognitions from the international community and the United Nations that East Jerusalem is an occupied city, and the Fourth Geneva Convention prohibits changing the status quo in Jerusalem, but Israel does not care about all of that.”
most affected
The education sector in East Jerusalem is considered the most prominent sector affected by the law prohibiting and restricting the activities of the Palestinian Authority if it is passed in the Knesset. In November 2019, the occupation closed the headquarters of the Palestinian Education Directorate in Jerusalem.
The Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Faisal Al-Husseini Foundation, Abdul Qader Al-Husseini, told Tel Aviv Tribune Net that the occupation launched an organized attack on the Palestinian curriculum in Jerusalem, and continuously tried to control the distribution of books and ensure that Palestinian schools in Jerusalem adhered to the distorted copies (by the occupation) whose content was tampered with. Consistent with his story.
Al-Husseini adds, “Laws are passed to facilitate people’s lives, and when the opposite happens, they lose their importance. Israel directly controls schools in which half of Jerusalemite students enroll, while the other half enrolls in schools operating under the Palestinian umbrella, some of which are affiliated with charitable or religious institutions. Therefore, it would be absurd.” Trying to close some of them with arbitrary decisions creates a problem bigger than the one it claims to be seeking to eliminate.”
Since the end of December 2022, when the current Israeli government took over the reins of power – which is considered one of the most extremist governments since the establishment of the occupying state – it has enacted several laws against Palestinians and Jerusalemites in particular, the most prominent of which is prohibiting the work of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) in the occupied territories and Jerusalem. .
A draft law was also approved to deport the families of those who carried out resistance operations inside and in Jerusalem to the Gaza Strip or other places (for a period of 10 to 20 years for Jerusalemites), in addition to strict control over the curricula taught in Jerusalem schools, conditional funding for the latter, and imposing the Israeli curriculum on schools. Which belongs to the occupation municipality in the city.
