again...some numbers and legal tools: At the time of the state’s inception, the Jewish population owned—togetherwith territories taken from the British Mandate—about 13.5 percent of theland inside the Green Line. By the early 1960s, however, 93 percent of allthe land in Israel had come under Jewish ownership or control and wasmaintained as public domain (Kedar 2001: 946). The board of directors of the Israel Land Administration—the governmental agency responsiblefor managing land—offers no representation to Palestinians: among its 22members, 12 are from government ministries and 10 are representatives of the Jewish National Fund (JNF). JNF is an international Jewish organiza-tion, not an Israeli national institute, and the Land Administration man-ages part of its lands in Israel.Israel’s remaining private lands are more or less equally divided between Jews and Palestinians. This ‘equality’, however, is deceptive. Israel’s publicland is not, in practice, available for Palestinians. That means that some20 percent of the population (i.e., the Palestinians) has access to only 3.5percent of the land. Moreover, other than attempts to centralize the Bed-ouin in the south, no new Palestinian town has been developed since 1948.And while, in principle, Palestinians can buy homes anywhere in Israel,in practice, they face major social and institutional obstacles that preventthem from acquiring land. Thus, there is no real possibility for substantialcohabitation between Jews and Palestinians. Coupled with the fact that,despite being citizens, Palestinians have been prevented from enjoying thestate’s common good, this land appropriation marked the first basic step inestablishing Israel’s anti-assimilationist policy against Palestinians academia.edu/2123248/The_Rule_of_Difference_How_Emergency_Powers_Prevent_Palestinian_Assimilation_in_Israel
Posted on: Mon, 02 Dec 2013 14:21:09 +0000
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