20 August 2020

Middle East

• On 19 August, Peace Now, Ir Amim and the Association of Environmental Justice in Israel jointly filed an objection to the Higher Planning Council of the Israeli Civil Administration in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT) against construction plans for some 3,500 housing units in the “E1” area east of Jerusalem. The NGOs warned that construction in E1 is considered essentially fatal to the prospect of a two-State solution because it divides the West Bank into two regions and prevents the development of the central Ramallah-East Jerusalem-Bethlehem metropolis in the West Bank.

• On 18 August, Al Mezan Centre for Human Rights issued a press release to denounce Israel’s tightening of punitive closure measures on the Gaza Strip and a ban on fuel imports. Al Mezan stated that the severe shortage in the power supply was bound to compound the suffering of Gaza’s residents and undermine the enjoyment of their economic, social and cultural rights and exacerbate the struggle of a severely depleted health sector, and stressed that this crisis is primarily the responsibility of Israel, the occupying power.

• On 18 August, Gisha – Legal Centre for Freedom of Movement denounced Israel’s continuing blockage on the entry of fuel into the Gaza Strip and the shutdown of the power plant due to fuel shortage. Gisha lamented that living conditions in Gaza were already difficult given the dire state of basic infrastructure and its beleaguered economy, largely the result of the ongoing closure imposed by Israel, and called on Israel to reverse immediately these illegal measures of collective punishment and stop deliberately violating the fundamental human rights of Gaza’s residents.

• On 18 August, the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR) published the report “Israeli Attacks on Human Rights Organizations and Activists” on the shrinking of space by the Israeli authorities for NGOs working in the OPT and the use of smear campaigns against them, restrictions of their freedom of movement, manipulation of their funding sources and threats directed at human rights defenders.

• On 17 August, Addameer Prisoner Support and Human Rights Association, Al-Haq and Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies sent a follow-up urgent appeal to the UN Special Procedures, reasserting the need for an intervention to uphold the right to health and safety of Palestinian prisoners in Israeli detention centres. Consequent to the initial urgent appeal, which was sent to five Special Procedures on 1 April 2020, the three NGOs addressed again four Special Procedures mandates, including the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the OPT, and explained how Israel’s systematic and long-established policy of medical negligence in Israel detention centres has been aggravated by recent decisions in the framework of the fight against Covid-19.

• On 17 August, B’Tselem issued the report “Water in Gaza: Scarce, Polluted and Mostly Unfit for Use” on the constant shortage of water suffered by some two million Gazans, which gets worse in the summer period. The report shares the stories of five Gazans who describe their constant pursuit of water, the effect of the salty water on their physical and mental health and on their belongings, and the financial burden of buying water they can barely afford.

• On 17 August, Al-Haq announced it will conduct its International Law Summer School Programme 2020 from 12 to 22 October 2020. The programme, conducted by human rights groups and civil society organizations, aims to assist professionals in developing a coherent understanding of the legal and human rights situation in the OPT while studying the application of international law in the OPT.

• On 17 August, BADIL – Resource Centre for Palestinian Residency& Refugee Rights, in partnership with Jewish Voice for Peace – Boston, completed a four-part series of webinars on “Present-Day Israeli Annexation”, “Trump’s Vision and Palestinian Refugees”, “Segregation, Fragmentation and Isolation” and “Conditional Funding”. The webinar series aimed to shed light on the current obstacles and challenges facing the Palestinian people in their struggle for liberation, their impact on Palestinian civil society, the shrinking space, and the role of the international community including its civil society.

• On 13 August, Physicians for Human Rights, Bimkom, B’Tselem, HaMoked and other Israeli organizations demanded that Israel immediately reverse measures constituting illegal collective punishment, in response the decision to limit the supply of essential goods, among them fuel required to operate Gaza’s sole power plant.

Europe

• On 14 August, Save the Children and the Permanent Mission of the Republic of Indonesia to the UN in New York co-hosted an informal briefing on Save the Children’s report “Danger Is Our Reality: The Impact of Conflict and the Occupation on Education in the West Bank of the Occupied Palestinian Territory”.

North America

• On 14 August, Americans for Peace Now hosted Jessica Montell from the Israeli human rights organization HaMoked after Israel’s Supreme Court, in a rare decision, had accepted the petition of a Palestinian family against a military order to punitively demolish its West Bank home. Ms. Montell, who helped file the petition, talked about the case and the doctrine and practice of house demolitions in the West bank.

• On 13 August, Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) issued the statement “We’re Not Buying It: Stop All Israeli Land Grands, Stop All Israeli Rights Violations” in response to Israel’s recent claim of suspending any attempt to annex Palestinian land, through Israel’s new trade agreement with the UAE. JVP stated such claim does nothing to halt the ongoing creeping annexation or the apartheid regime it imposes on Palestinians. JVP added that the US-brokered deal between Israel and the UAE was merely the latest example of governments trading away Palestinian rights and the pressures needed to be kept up on US government to stop enabling Israeli violations.

• On 13 August, J Street issued a press release to welcome the announcement that Israel is suspending plans to annex parts of the West Bank and that the UAE and Israel are taking steps to establish more normalized ties. J Street said, however, while it was good that the de jure unilateral annexation is apparently off the table for the immediate future, the harmful reality is that creeping de facto annexation continues every day unabated, and called for an end to occupation, settlement expansion and ongoing violations of the rights of the Palestinian people, even if the threat of formal annexation is halted.

United Nations

• On 27 August, the UN Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People (CEIRPP) will hold Part 2 of the International Conference on the Question of Jerusalem on “Annexation in Practice – Palestinian Youth in Jerusalem”. The event, which will be livestreamed on UN Web TV from 10.00 a.m. to 12 p.m. NY time, will feature H.E. Mr. Fadi Hidmi, Minister of Jerusalem Affairs of the State of Palestine, and three experts – Mr. Micha Kurz, former Grassroots Jerusalem and Breaking the Silence; Ms. Reem Natsheh, Women Centre for Legal Aid and Counselling; and Ms. Rochelle Watson, Friends of Sabeel North America – who will highlight the lived reality of young Palestinians, and particularly young women, in East Jerusalem under the Israeli occupation and annexation and to discuss ways to sustain the resilience of the Palestinian Jerusalemites and support their socio-economic efforts, cultural works and political engagement.

 

This newsletter informs about recent and upcoming activities of Civil Society Organizations affiliated with the United Nations Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People. The Committee and the Division for Palestinian Rights of the UN Secretariat provide the information “as is” without warranty of any kind, and do not accept any responsibility or liability for the accuracy, or reliability of the information contained in the websites linked in the newsletter.