Following petition by Gisha, Israel reverses decision to deny woman’s request to return to her home in the West Bank with her two daughters
June 25, 2019. On January 27, 2019, Gisha submitted a petition on behalf of a Palestinian woman who was born in the West Bank in 1996. In 2017, she moved to live with her spouse in the Gaza Strip, because her spouse’s registered address is in Gaza, and Israel does not allow Palestinians whose registered address is in Gaza to live in the West Bank, even for the purpose of “family reunification.” The couple have two daughters, both born in Gaza, but whose registered addresses are in the West Bank, as determined by their mother’s registration. Given the dire living conditions in the Strip, the parents decided it would be better for the girls to live and grow up in the West Bank, even if it means living separately from their father.
In 2018, the petitioner submitted an application for a permit to return to the West Bank with her daughters, but Israel denied the request. In its response (Hebrew) to a letter sent by Gisha on her behalf, received on November 6, 2018, the Civil Liaison Administration (CLA) claimed that the petitioner had filed an application previously for “settlement in the Gaza Strip” and signed a declaration in order to have it approved. The CLA maintained that by doing so, the petitioner agreed to comply with Israel’s access policies for Gaza residents, including the procedure permitting relocation to the West Bank only in exceptional humanitarian cases.
The petitioner had indeed signed a form after she was informed by Israeli authorities that she would not be allowed to relocate to the Strip if she did not sign it. She did so without understanding the implications. When she moved to Gaza, she believed that she would still be able to return to the West Bank and live there, where she was born and raised, whenever she wanted to. Her registered address is still in the West Bank, and so is that of her two daughters.
In the petition (Hebrew), Gisha argued that Israel’s decision to bar the petitioner from returning to her home in the West Bank was a violation of Article 49 of the Geneva Convention, which prohibits an occupying power from transferring or deporting the protected population under occupation. We demonstrated that the accepted interpretations of the terms ‘forcible transfer’ and ‘expulsion’ are broad, including a ban on relocating a person against their will, whether by using direct or indirect pressure, or by exploiting governmental powers. In this context, any alleged “consent” on the part of the individual should be examined carefully, with special consideration to the circumstances in which it was given and attention to that person’s level of vulnerability.
Gisha further argued that the implications of signing the document were not explained to the petitioner at the time she signed it, and that, in any event, without thorough knowledge of Israel’s policy on the matter, she could not have known that signing the document would mean waiving her future right to return to the West Bank. As such, Gisha argued that blocking the petitioner from returning home with her daughters is a severe violation of her fundamental rights, and that the CLA’s decision is unreasonable and disproportionate.
Judge Eli Abarbanel granted the state’s request for an extension and instructed the state to answer by March 24, 2019. A hearing was scheduled for April 4, 2019.
In their preliminary response (Hebrew) to the petition, the respondents insisted that having moved to Gaza “of her own free will” and given that she signed the form for “settlement in the Gaza Strip”, the petitioner was now registered as a resident of Gaza, meaning she had no right to return to the West Bank, and furthermore, that she was no longer considered a “protected person” under international law. They further claimed that allowing the petitioner to return to the West Bank would fundamentally undermine Israel’s “separation policy,” aimed at reducing movement between Gaza and the West Bank.
In our response (Hebrew) to the state’s arguments, we explained why the petitioner is still in fact a “protected person” under the Geneva Convention, meaning that the respondents are obliged by international law to respect her basic rights. We also reiterated that given the circumstances of the case, the petitioner had in no way consented of her own free will to waive her status as a West Bank resident.
*Update, June 25, 2019. Following the court’s comments during the hearing on the petition on April 8, 2019, the respondents agreed to reexamine the petitioner’s request. On May 26, 2019, Israeli authorities notified Gisha that her application had been approved. On June 25, after two years of uncertainty, the petitioner finally moved back to the West Bank with her two daughters.
The case serves as an important reminder of the far-reaching impact of Israel’s permit regime, supported by Israel’s ongoing control over the Palestinian population registry, which it uses to restrict the movement of Palestinians and to forcibly transfer residents of the occupied territory.
