30 july 2016
Abed Aghbariya's illegal house near Umm al-Fahm
Near Umm al-Fahm stands a monument to the weakness of the rule of law in the State of Israel: A giant house, whose illegal construction began 13 years ago and which despite demolition orders and a series of judicial decisions remains standing.
Three lots are gleaming white on a mountain range peppered with olive trees. Several weeks ago, a power shovel disrupted the pastoral quiet as it worked to prepare the ground near Umm al-Fahm for farming. But while the land has now been deemed fit for agricultural use, it has not been qualified by law.
The development of these lots was done without the proper planning and permits. After all, why does one need building permits when no one enforces the law?
A large house stands next to the three new lots, 600 square meters (some 6,500 square feet) in size, whose illegal construction began in 2003. 13 years later and despite demolition orders and a series of judicial decisions, the house remains standing—for the glory of the State of Israel. As stones do, the house built by Sheikh Abed Aghbariyya remains silent, but its walls laugh in scorn at the police, the court and the State Attorney's Office.
It was State Attorney Shai Nitzan who put the house in the spotlight. "You cannot overstate the importance of carrying out the (demolition) order in a case that has become a touchstone for our ability to maintain and protect the rule of law and enforce the law without fear or bias," Nitzan wrote to former Police Commissioner Yohanan Danino in December 2014 in a long letter titled "Police assistance in carrying out a demolition order in Umm al-Fahm, Abed Aghbariya."
The order Niztan is referring to is a judicial demolition order issued back in 2007. Not only was it not executed, but Aghbariya has since built a second floor and even populated the house despite a court order prohibiting the use of the building.
The District Court rejected Aghbariya's appeal against the demolition order, determining that "It is impossible not to marvel at the audacity of the petitioners on the one hand, and the inadequacy—or perhaps weakness—of state authorities on the other, which has resulted in a public and open violation, for many years, of both the prohibitions set out in the Planning and Building Law and of judicial decisions."
The problem is that authorities have continued exhibiting laxness and repeatedly asked for a postponement in the execution of the demolition, to the point where the courts had to intervene: "One must remember that failing to carry out the judicial demolition order for years constitutes a violation of the rule of law and is tantamount to contempt of court orders. The longer it takes to execute the judicial order, the bigger the damage done to the rule of law."
The criminal is rewarded
So what prevents law enforcement authorities from carrying out the demolition order? Nitzan's letter clearly points to this—the lack of police assistance.
"I ask, therefore, that you instruct the relevant bodies to provide police assistance as soon as possible ... if the order is not carried out, it would be a disgrace to the rule of law!" the state attorney wrote to the police commissioner.
What kind of police assistance is needed? When there is concern that the demolition of an illegal structure could deteriorate to violence, the inspectors need to be accompanied by police. The police, low on manpower and wary of setting the area aflame, is not keen on providing assistance for the demolition of illegal structures. Over the years, this has gradually led to the chaotic situation that exists today.
According to Yishai Hemo of the NGO Regavim (The National Land Protection Trust), which tracks illegal constructions in the Arab sector, the situation in northern Israel and especially in Wadi Ara is rather grave. Hemo claims that over 50,000 illegal structures have been built in northern Israel, 10,000 of which in Wadi Ara alone. Every year, the construction of some 3,000 illegal structures begins.
Regavim even petitioned the High Court of Justice in early 2015 against Haifa's District Planning and Building Committee, demanding that the demolition order against Aghbariyya be enforced, but the court decided not to intervene.
And it's not just right-wing organizations that are worried about the lack of enforcement. "For several years now, illegal structures have not been demolished in our area," says an Arab member of another District Planning and Building Committee in northern Israel. "When there are no demolitions, there is no deterrence, and when there is no deterrence, dozens of new illegal structures are built every year." It's the general Arab population that pays the price for this.
"In recent years, there has been a significant attempt to advance construction in our sector, but by the time the plans were approved, they were no longer relevant, because illegal structures had already been built on that land. This reality left authorities with no choice but to prepare new plans, at the expense of taxpayers. This means that a criminal who built his home illegally, for example where a road was planned to serve all residents, is being rewarded. We have to resolve this issue. Unfortunately, most of the chairpersons of the District Planning and Building committees are politicians afraid of confronting (those who build illegally) who refrain from signing demolition orders. And when they do sign these orders, the police doesn't help carry them out."
Israel's governments throughout the years have also tried to combat the phenomenon with a series of decisions meant to give the Israel Police the tools it needs to assist in the enforcement of these orders. A government decision from 2004 titled "Increasing Enforcement of the Planning and Building Law" instructed the Israel Police to form a special unit called the Coordination Directorate of Land Law Enforcement. The unit was allocated a generous budget of 26 million shekels a year and manned with 114 police officers. According to the government decision, the unit's police officers were to deal strictly with land law enforcement.
The government also set clear objectives for the unit, namely, "Aiding in structure demolition operations by providing the required police force to carry out the demolition, with no less than 501 demolitions a year."
In 2007, the State Comptroller examined the implementation of the decision. The comptroller found that in certain areas in the north, particularly in Wadi Ara, "most of the requests made by supervisory bodies for police assistance remained unanswered and as a result the demolitions were not carried out."
In general, the comptroller determined, "the Coordination Directorate of Land Law Enforcement was not meeting its objectives."
The comptroller, however, did not put the blame on the unit, but on the various police districts that failed to grant the necessary approvals for the operations.
In light of the comptroller report, the government increased the unit's required amount of demolitions, further requiring the police to file a report every quarter detailing the demolitions that were carried out and threatening to close down the unit should it continue failing to meet its objectives.
And then, like magic, reports with imaginary numbers appeared on the government's desk. For example, a letter submitted on behalf of the police commissioner to the Public Security Ministry claimed that in 2012, Israel Police was tasked with demolishing 666 structures but demolished 1,671—meaning, a 251 percent execution rate.
"These numbers do not conform to reality—and I know what happens on the ground well," said a building supervisor in the north. "The police count every pillar in a building, or every little shed as an illegal structure."
The unit, meanwhile, claims the numbers are not inflated and that every structure that was demolished was only counted once.
Over the years, the unit presented the following numbers: In 2013, police were required to demolish 732 structures but managed to demolish 2,906. In 2014, police were required to demolish 805 structures and demolished 2,481. In 2015, the police were required to demolish 886 structures and demolished 1,904.
The police refused to provide information on how many structures were demolished in each district or sector, and so the data presented included all the demolitions carried out throughout the country.
At a directorate conference, however, entirely different numbers were presented. A screenshot obtained by Yedioth Ahronoth, Ynet's sister publication, from a PowerPoint presentation shows that in 2014, for example, only 19 demolitions were carried out with the assistance of the Israel Police. What could be behind this gap?
For one, the reports that the unit produced for the police commissioner specifically stated that the numbers released publicly included demolitions carried out by the owners of the illegal structures themselves. In 2014, for example, 59 percent of the demolitions were done by the illegal home owners. But somewhere along the journey from the police commissioner's desk to the Public Security Ministry and from there to the government, the distinction between demolitions carried out by the home owners and those done with assistance from the police disappeared.
The bottom line is that the Israeli government, which receives inflated data, continues investing 26 million shekels every year in the unit in return for police assistance in less than 20 demolitions a year. This while documents obtained by Yedioth Ahronoth show that in 2015, the government also received a report claiming the unit's success rate stood at hundreds of percents.
Zero demolitions
The Coordination Directorate claims that the demolitions done by the illegal home owners are included in the report because the Israel Police invests resources in negotiating and encouraging them to carry out the demolitions themselves.
To examine the validity of this claim, we look again to Abed Aghbariyya. On May 5, 2015, after Shai Nitzan's scathing letter and after court orders ruled the house must be demolished, a meeting was held in secret, kept from the State Attorney's Office.
Evidence of this meeting can be found in an internal document that leaked and was obtained by the Regavim NGO. Abed Aghbariyya and the commander of the Umm al-Fahm police station were both present at the meeting.
"The Umm al-Fahm station commander, Chief Superintendent Rami Yadaan, agrees to refrain from carrying out the demolition before May 30, 2015," the document summarizing the meeting stated. "On the other hand, the gentlemen, on behalf of the entire family, commit to demolishing the house themselves if the legal procedure is not successful by the aforementioned date, without the involvement of police or other authorities."
Near Umm al-Fahm stands a monument to the weakness of the rule of law in the State of Israel: A giant house, whose illegal construction began 13 years ago and which despite demolition orders and a series of judicial decisions remains standing.
Three lots are gleaming white on a mountain range peppered with olive trees. Several weeks ago, a power shovel disrupted the pastoral quiet as it worked to prepare the ground near Umm al-Fahm for farming. But while the land has now been deemed fit for agricultural use, it has not been qualified by law.
The development of these lots was done without the proper planning and permits. After all, why does one need building permits when no one enforces the law?
A large house stands next to the three new lots, 600 square meters (some 6,500 square feet) in size, whose illegal construction began in 2003. 13 years later and despite demolition orders and a series of judicial decisions, the house remains standing—for the glory of the State of Israel. As stones do, the house built by Sheikh Abed Aghbariyya remains silent, but its walls laugh in scorn at the police, the court and the State Attorney's Office.
It was State Attorney Shai Nitzan who put the house in the spotlight. "You cannot overstate the importance of carrying out the (demolition) order in a case that has become a touchstone for our ability to maintain and protect the rule of law and enforce the law without fear or bias," Nitzan wrote to former Police Commissioner Yohanan Danino in December 2014 in a long letter titled "Police assistance in carrying out a demolition order in Umm al-Fahm, Abed Aghbariya."
The order Niztan is referring to is a judicial demolition order issued back in 2007. Not only was it not executed, but Aghbariya has since built a second floor and even populated the house despite a court order prohibiting the use of the building.
The District Court rejected Aghbariya's appeal against the demolition order, determining that "It is impossible not to marvel at the audacity of the petitioners on the one hand, and the inadequacy—or perhaps weakness—of state authorities on the other, which has resulted in a public and open violation, for many years, of both the prohibitions set out in the Planning and Building Law and of judicial decisions."
The problem is that authorities have continued exhibiting laxness and repeatedly asked for a postponement in the execution of the demolition, to the point where the courts had to intervene: "One must remember that failing to carry out the judicial demolition order for years constitutes a violation of the rule of law and is tantamount to contempt of court orders. The longer it takes to execute the judicial order, the bigger the damage done to the rule of law."
The criminal is rewarded
So what prevents law enforcement authorities from carrying out the demolition order? Nitzan's letter clearly points to this—the lack of police assistance.
"I ask, therefore, that you instruct the relevant bodies to provide police assistance as soon as possible ... if the order is not carried out, it would be a disgrace to the rule of law!" the state attorney wrote to the police commissioner.
What kind of police assistance is needed? When there is concern that the demolition of an illegal structure could deteriorate to violence, the inspectors need to be accompanied by police. The police, low on manpower and wary of setting the area aflame, is not keen on providing assistance for the demolition of illegal structures. Over the years, this has gradually led to the chaotic situation that exists today.
According to Yishai Hemo of the NGO Regavim (The National Land Protection Trust), which tracks illegal constructions in the Arab sector, the situation in northern Israel and especially in Wadi Ara is rather grave. Hemo claims that over 50,000 illegal structures have been built in northern Israel, 10,000 of which in Wadi Ara alone. Every year, the construction of some 3,000 illegal structures begins.
Regavim even petitioned the High Court of Justice in early 2015 against Haifa's District Planning and Building Committee, demanding that the demolition order against Aghbariyya be enforced, but the court decided not to intervene.
And it's not just right-wing organizations that are worried about the lack of enforcement. "For several years now, illegal structures have not been demolished in our area," says an Arab member of another District Planning and Building Committee in northern Israel. "When there are no demolitions, there is no deterrence, and when there is no deterrence, dozens of new illegal structures are built every year." It's the general Arab population that pays the price for this.
"In recent years, there has been a significant attempt to advance construction in our sector, but by the time the plans were approved, they were no longer relevant, because illegal structures had already been built on that land. This reality left authorities with no choice but to prepare new plans, at the expense of taxpayers. This means that a criminal who built his home illegally, for example where a road was planned to serve all residents, is being rewarded. We have to resolve this issue. Unfortunately, most of the chairpersons of the District Planning and Building committees are politicians afraid of confronting (those who build illegally) who refrain from signing demolition orders. And when they do sign these orders, the police doesn't help carry them out."
Israel's governments throughout the years have also tried to combat the phenomenon with a series of decisions meant to give the Israel Police the tools it needs to assist in the enforcement of these orders. A government decision from 2004 titled "Increasing Enforcement of the Planning and Building Law" instructed the Israel Police to form a special unit called the Coordination Directorate of Land Law Enforcement. The unit was allocated a generous budget of 26 million shekels a year and manned with 114 police officers. According to the government decision, the unit's police officers were to deal strictly with land law enforcement.
The government also set clear objectives for the unit, namely, "Aiding in structure demolition operations by providing the required police force to carry out the demolition, with no less than 501 demolitions a year."
In 2007, the State Comptroller examined the implementation of the decision. The comptroller found that in certain areas in the north, particularly in Wadi Ara, "most of the requests made by supervisory bodies for police assistance remained unanswered and as a result the demolitions were not carried out."
In general, the comptroller determined, "the Coordination Directorate of Land Law Enforcement was not meeting its objectives."
The comptroller, however, did not put the blame on the unit, but on the various police districts that failed to grant the necessary approvals for the operations.
In light of the comptroller report, the government increased the unit's required amount of demolitions, further requiring the police to file a report every quarter detailing the demolitions that were carried out and threatening to close down the unit should it continue failing to meet its objectives.
And then, like magic, reports with imaginary numbers appeared on the government's desk. For example, a letter submitted on behalf of the police commissioner to the Public Security Ministry claimed that in 2012, Israel Police was tasked with demolishing 666 structures but demolished 1,671—meaning, a 251 percent execution rate.
"These numbers do not conform to reality—and I know what happens on the ground well," said a building supervisor in the north. "The police count every pillar in a building, or every little shed as an illegal structure."
The unit, meanwhile, claims the numbers are not inflated and that every structure that was demolished was only counted once.
Over the years, the unit presented the following numbers: In 2013, police were required to demolish 732 structures but managed to demolish 2,906. In 2014, police were required to demolish 805 structures and demolished 2,481. In 2015, the police were required to demolish 886 structures and demolished 1,904.
The police refused to provide information on how many structures were demolished in each district or sector, and so the data presented included all the demolitions carried out throughout the country.
At a directorate conference, however, entirely different numbers were presented. A screenshot obtained by Yedioth Ahronoth, Ynet's sister publication, from a PowerPoint presentation shows that in 2014, for example, only 19 demolitions were carried out with the assistance of the Israel Police. What could be behind this gap?
For one, the reports that the unit produced for the police commissioner specifically stated that the numbers released publicly included demolitions carried out by the owners of the illegal structures themselves. In 2014, for example, 59 percent of the demolitions were done by the illegal home owners. But somewhere along the journey from the police commissioner's desk to the Public Security Ministry and from there to the government, the distinction between demolitions carried out by the home owners and those done with assistance from the police disappeared.
The bottom line is that the Israeli government, which receives inflated data, continues investing 26 million shekels every year in the unit in return for police assistance in less than 20 demolitions a year. This while documents obtained by Yedioth Ahronoth show that in 2015, the government also received a report claiming the unit's success rate stood at hundreds of percents.
Zero demolitions
The Coordination Directorate claims that the demolitions done by the illegal home owners are included in the report because the Israel Police invests resources in negotiating and encouraging them to carry out the demolitions themselves.
To examine the validity of this claim, we look again to Abed Aghbariyya. On May 5, 2015, after Shai Nitzan's scathing letter and after court orders ruled the house must be demolished, a meeting was held in secret, kept from the State Attorney's Office.
Evidence of this meeting can be found in an internal document that leaked and was obtained by the Regavim NGO. Abed Aghbariyya and the commander of the Umm al-Fahm police station were both present at the meeting.
"The Umm al-Fahm station commander, Chief Superintendent Rami Yadaan, agrees to refrain from carrying out the demolition before May 30, 2015," the document summarizing the meeting stated. "On the other hand, the gentlemen, on behalf of the entire family, commit to demolishing the house themselves if the legal procedure is not successful by the aforementioned date, without the involvement of police or other authorities."
The agreement signed between the Umm al-Fahm police commander and Aghbariyya
Had this agreement been honored, it would have been a wonderful example of how police force encourages illegal home owners to carry out the demolitions themselves. Except that May 30, 2015, has come and gone, and for over a year now the police has been avoiding enforcing its part of the agreement by demolishing the house.
Some are angry not just about the violation of the agreement, but about the very fact such a meeting took place.
"It's very serious that the police are holding meetings that are being kept from us," an official from the State Attorney's Office said. "This meeting constitutes negotiations with a criminal after the court has already ruled on the case. We demanded that the police clarify the matter, but have yet to receive a response."
According to officials in the supervisory bodies, police are not involved in most of the demolitions done by the illegal home owners.
"The police call us asking for information on demolitions by illegal home owners because not only do they not know the process, they don't even have a clue as to how many such demolitions have happened," a senior official said. "It's really easy to count every farming shed or balcony in Ra'anana that were demolished without police assistance. Of course, demolitions by the home owners are preferable to a confrontation and cost the state a lot less, but the numbers point to a considerable drop in such demolitions. Demolitions by illegal home owners don't happen where there is no enforcement."
"In Umm al-Fahm, it's been three years now with not a single demolition. Zero demolitions. Why? Because there are planning and building committees that don't function and there is no police assistance. That's what the Coordination Directorate was created for. And the problem is not necessarily the unit—which is trying to meet its objectives—but the police district commanders. They're the ones who need to authorize the demolition operations and command over them. But a district commander wants peace and quiet, not to set the area ablaze. We've had instances where a large-scale demolition operation was organized, bulldozers were rented for hundreds of thousands of shekels, but the information about the impending operation leaked and the police canceled it at the last moment."
Nabil Dahar, the Chairperson of the Lev HaGalil Planning and Construction Committee, has given up on receiving police assistance. Several months ago, Dahar decided to carry out demolitions without police assistance. He hired the services of a private security company and demolished several illegal structures. During one of these demolitions, matters deteriorated to serious violence and police had to intervene.
Following that incident, and after Dahar insisted he will not stop carrying out the demolition orders, the local police started fully cooperating with him.
"Today we have excellent cooperation with the police and we can already see the results on the ground. Take, for example, Arraba—every month we'd find 10 new illegal structures there. Today, it's barely one a month," he said.
A team appointed by the Attorney General to examine solutions to the problem of illegal construction filed its report in January 2016. The team, led by Deputy Attorney General Erez Kaminski, was asked to examine the issue of police assistance, among other things.
"The State Attorney's Office, the Coordination Directorate of Land Law Enforcement, and the Israel Land Authority have repeatedly emphasized the difficulty in receiving police assistance ... the information presented did indeed point to requests for police assistance that received no response, mostly in the non-Jewish sector ... the team was unable to bridge the gap between claims on the lack of proper assistance from the police in the execution of the orders, and the Israel Police's claims that it provides optimal assistance in accordance with requirements. Furthermore, the team had difficulty obtaining accurate information on the issue."
"This is a conciliatory report," said one of the members of that team. "We realized there was no point in reprimanding the police for inflating the numbers because we have to keep working with them."
"Yes, the information from the different bodies did not match," Kaminski confirmed. "Everyone realizes there is a problem and everyone wants to change things. Our goal is to point to cases in which there is a systematic violation of the law, to which the police will commit at the beginning of every year to demolish under the supervision of a special team made up of representatives of all enforcement authorities. We've started working under this framework and we can already see the difference."
Is Aghbariya seen as a sort of symbol?
"Aghbariya's house symbolizes the bad reputation of the Planning and Building Law, which turned into the 'Building and Planning Law.' First, illegal structures are built, and then the planning is done around them. Eventually, the aggressive conduct of that gentleman, as a systematic violator of orders, made the planning and building committee lean in his favor. Unfortunately, the Umm al-Fahm planning authorities have already recommended authorizing a plan that would legalize his house."
With this recommendation, Aghbariya turned to the Hadera Magistrate's Court last March and demanded to freeze the demolition order because, he claimed, there is a chance his house will receive legal status. Unlike the district court, the Magistrate's Court judge accepted the request and froze the demolition order for a year.
The State Attorney's Office was quick to appeal the decision to the Haifa District Court, which then overruled the decision and determined the house must be demolished. Law enforcement authorities have been trying to carry out the demolition, but once again the police force prevented it. This led the Regavim NGO to send a harsh letter to the police.
Meanwhile, Aghbariya has been pressuring the District Planning and Building Committee to legalize the house.
Kaminski sent a letter to the committee, urging it not to legalize the structure. "However, I fear that in the end it will," said Kaminski. "And I want to tell planning authorities that they too should safeguard the rule of law. It is particularly acute in Aghbariya's case, as he became a symbol of undermining the rule of law."
The Israel Police has responded by saying, "The Coordination Directorate of Land Law Enforcement combines activities in the field of planning and building and land offenses all over the country, including carrying out demolition orders alongside encouraging illegal home owners to carry out the demolitions themselves.
The results of these activities indicate the unit is meeting its objectives, even beyond the objectives set in its work plan by the government. Any attempt to distort the work and create gaps in information by presenting partial data from one body or another while leaving out the Israel Police's professional cooperation with all of its partners and especially its encouraging illegal house owners to carry out the demolitions, sins against the truth and presents a false display that should be rejected out of hand."
Had this agreement been honored, it would have been a wonderful example of how police force encourages illegal home owners to carry out the demolitions themselves. Except that May 30, 2015, has come and gone, and for over a year now the police has been avoiding enforcing its part of the agreement by demolishing the house.
Some are angry not just about the violation of the agreement, but about the very fact such a meeting took place.
"It's very serious that the police are holding meetings that are being kept from us," an official from the State Attorney's Office said. "This meeting constitutes negotiations with a criminal after the court has already ruled on the case. We demanded that the police clarify the matter, but have yet to receive a response."
According to officials in the supervisory bodies, police are not involved in most of the demolitions done by the illegal home owners.
"The police call us asking for information on demolitions by illegal home owners because not only do they not know the process, they don't even have a clue as to how many such demolitions have happened," a senior official said. "It's really easy to count every farming shed or balcony in Ra'anana that were demolished without police assistance. Of course, demolitions by the home owners are preferable to a confrontation and cost the state a lot less, but the numbers point to a considerable drop in such demolitions. Demolitions by illegal home owners don't happen where there is no enforcement."
"In Umm al-Fahm, it's been three years now with not a single demolition. Zero demolitions. Why? Because there are planning and building committees that don't function and there is no police assistance. That's what the Coordination Directorate was created for. And the problem is not necessarily the unit—which is trying to meet its objectives—but the police district commanders. They're the ones who need to authorize the demolition operations and command over them. But a district commander wants peace and quiet, not to set the area ablaze. We've had instances where a large-scale demolition operation was organized, bulldozers were rented for hundreds of thousands of shekels, but the information about the impending operation leaked and the police canceled it at the last moment."
Nabil Dahar, the Chairperson of the Lev HaGalil Planning and Construction Committee, has given up on receiving police assistance. Several months ago, Dahar decided to carry out demolitions without police assistance. He hired the services of a private security company and demolished several illegal structures. During one of these demolitions, matters deteriorated to serious violence and police had to intervene.
Following that incident, and after Dahar insisted he will not stop carrying out the demolition orders, the local police started fully cooperating with him.
"Today we have excellent cooperation with the police and we can already see the results on the ground. Take, for example, Arraba—every month we'd find 10 new illegal structures there. Today, it's barely one a month," he said.
A team appointed by the Attorney General to examine solutions to the problem of illegal construction filed its report in January 2016. The team, led by Deputy Attorney General Erez Kaminski, was asked to examine the issue of police assistance, among other things.
"The State Attorney's Office, the Coordination Directorate of Land Law Enforcement, and the Israel Land Authority have repeatedly emphasized the difficulty in receiving police assistance ... the information presented did indeed point to requests for police assistance that received no response, mostly in the non-Jewish sector ... the team was unable to bridge the gap between claims on the lack of proper assistance from the police in the execution of the orders, and the Israel Police's claims that it provides optimal assistance in accordance with requirements. Furthermore, the team had difficulty obtaining accurate information on the issue."
"This is a conciliatory report," said one of the members of that team. "We realized there was no point in reprimanding the police for inflating the numbers because we have to keep working with them."
"Yes, the information from the different bodies did not match," Kaminski confirmed. "Everyone realizes there is a problem and everyone wants to change things. Our goal is to point to cases in which there is a systematic violation of the law, to which the police will commit at the beginning of every year to demolish under the supervision of a special team made up of representatives of all enforcement authorities. We've started working under this framework and we can already see the difference."
Is Aghbariya seen as a sort of symbol?
"Aghbariya's house symbolizes the bad reputation of the Planning and Building Law, which turned into the 'Building and Planning Law.' First, illegal structures are built, and then the planning is done around them. Eventually, the aggressive conduct of that gentleman, as a systematic violator of orders, made the planning and building committee lean in his favor. Unfortunately, the Umm al-Fahm planning authorities have already recommended authorizing a plan that would legalize his house."
With this recommendation, Aghbariya turned to the Hadera Magistrate's Court last March and demanded to freeze the demolition order because, he claimed, there is a chance his house will receive legal status. Unlike the district court, the Magistrate's Court judge accepted the request and froze the demolition order for a year.
The State Attorney's Office was quick to appeal the decision to the Haifa District Court, which then overruled the decision and determined the house must be demolished. Law enforcement authorities have been trying to carry out the demolition, but once again the police force prevented it. This led the Regavim NGO to send a harsh letter to the police.
Meanwhile, Aghbariya has been pressuring the District Planning and Building Committee to legalize the house.
Kaminski sent a letter to the committee, urging it not to legalize the structure. "However, I fear that in the end it will," said Kaminski. "And I want to tell planning authorities that they too should safeguard the rule of law. It is particularly acute in Aghbariya's case, as he became a symbol of undermining the rule of law."
The Israel Police has responded by saying, "The Coordination Directorate of Land Law Enforcement combines activities in the field of planning and building and land offenses all over the country, including carrying out demolition orders alongside encouraging illegal home owners to carry out the demolitions themselves.
The results of these activities indicate the unit is meeting its objectives, even beyond the objectives set in its work plan by the government. Any attempt to distort the work and create gaps in information by presenting partial data from one body or another while leaving out the Israel Police's professional cooperation with all of its partners and especially its encouraging illegal house owners to carry out the demolitions, sins against the truth and presents a false display that should be rejected out of hand."
28 july 2016
Ambassador Mohamed al-Emadi, head of Qatar's national committee for the reconstruction of Gaza, is slated to arrive in the Gaza Strip on Thursday night through the Beit Hanoun (Erez) border crossing.
Al-Ray new agency quoted an official source from the Qatari committee as saying that ambassador Emadi would arrive in Gaza at about 11 o'clock in the evening.
The source added that details of the visit would be announced later, expecting that the ambassador might stay in Gaza for two or three weeks.
Al-Ray new agency quoted an official source from the Qatari committee as saying that ambassador Emadi would arrive in Gaza at about 11 o'clock in the evening.
The source added that details of the visit would be announced later, expecting that the ambassador might stay in Gaza for two or three weeks.
25 july 2016
Palestinian Minister of Public Works and Housing Mufid al-Hasayna Sunday declared that 1000 new apartments are scheduled to be built in Gaza under the auspices of the Islamic Development Bank in Jeddah.
In a press conference held Sunday in Gaza city, al-Hasayna called on Gazan families living currently in mobile houses to prepare and deliver their building design to the Ministry within a week.
He pointed out that 70% of their damaged houses were rebuilt. Over the past three months, the Ministry handed out keys of 1154 apartments estimated at $19 million to Gazan families affected by the Israeli aggression on Gaza in summer 2014, mostly within the Kuwaiti grant.
550 more affected families are also scheduled to have their homes in the near future, the Minister clarified. Since the Israeli summer aggression on the Strip, the Ministry managed to rebuild 100,000 destroyed homes with a cost of $180 million.
Concerning the Qatari grant, the Minister pointed out that his Ministry handed out keys of 1060 apartments of Hamad City in Khan Younis to Gazan families affected by the Israeli aggression on Gaza in summer 2014.
Only 51% of the needed funds for the reconstruction of damaged houses in Gaza had been allocated, he underlined. The besieged Gaza Strip suffers from a housing shortage estimated at 130,000 housing units after the latest Israeli aggression. The shortage was 75,000 units before the aggression.
In a press conference held Sunday in Gaza city, al-Hasayna called on Gazan families living currently in mobile houses to prepare and deliver their building design to the Ministry within a week.
He pointed out that 70% of their damaged houses were rebuilt. Over the past three months, the Ministry handed out keys of 1154 apartments estimated at $19 million to Gazan families affected by the Israeli aggression on Gaza in summer 2014, mostly within the Kuwaiti grant.
550 more affected families are also scheduled to have their homes in the near future, the Minister clarified. Since the Israeli summer aggression on the Strip, the Ministry managed to rebuild 100,000 destroyed homes with a cost of $180 million.
Concerning the Qatari grant, the Minister pointed out that his Ministry handed out keys of 1060 apartments of Hamad City in Khan Younis to Gazan families affected by the Israeli aggression on Gaza in summer 2014.
Only 51% of the needed funds for the reconstruction of damaged houses in Gaza had been allocated, he underlined. The besieged Gaza Strip suffers from a housing shortage estimated at 130,000 housing units after the latest Israeli aggression. The shortage was 75,000 units before the aggression.
24 july 2016
The Project Unified Assistance (PUA) seeks to rehash the idea of a humanitarian airport supervised by the UN, in the fifties and sixties of last century, east of Gaza city.
Five years ago, Ahmad Al-Khatib, the projects’ director, launched an initiative to establish a UN airport in Gaza, in an attempt the ease the livelihoods of Gazans living under blockade since ten years.
(PUA) is a US-based humanitarian nonprofit organization advocating the establishment of a UN operated and regulated airport in the Gaza Strip, according to Al Ray Palestinian Media Agency.
Al-Khatib assured that the idea is not extraordinary, adding that the United Nations operated, between 1956 and 1967, an airport in the Gaza Strip as a part of the United Nations Emergency Force, which was created in order to supervise the “disentanglement” of the armies of Egypt, Britain, France and Israel, in the Sinai Peninsula and the Gaza Strip.
Historical images show UN planes at the Gaza Airport, which served the UN Emergency Force and Gaza’s inhabitants. The use of the airport was expanded from military purposes to civilian applications whereby UN planes provided transportation services and carried passengers and humanitarian/commercial cargo to and from the Gaza Strip, Al-Khatib added.
Al-Khatib said that the UN airport may represent a window of hope of patients and students stuck in Gaza, and contributing to the reconstruction process.
A recent United Nations report warned that the Gaza Strip will be uninhabitable by 2020 for its 1.8 million residents.
According to the report, serious changes must be implemented to reverse the damage done to the coastal enclave’s development. Additionally, the World Bank warned, in May of 2016, that Gaza’s economy is on the verge of collapse and that youth unemployment is the highest in the region, at 60%. After years of war, destruction, and poverty, an airport for functional purposes could help accelerate Gaza’s reconstruction and redevelopment process. It would also relieve Gazans’ chronic inability to travel in and out of the Strip in an effective and safe manner, Al-Khatib highlighted.
Al-Khatib demonstrated the social, economic and political benefits of creating an independent travel mechanism that would allow Gazans to exit and enter the territory through a secure non-Egyptian and non-Israeli crossing.
The idea will develop a sound operations model and effective procedures for how the airport is to be operated by the United Nations with financial support from Arab, regional, and international stakeholders, he added.
PUA identified a new site that will allow airplanes to fly over Mediterranean and international waters, in order to avoid Israeli airspace. After detailed analysis, PUA proposes the construction of an airport on the southwestern coast of the Gaza Strip between the cities of Khan Younis and Rafah, on the grounds of the former Jewish settlement of “Gush Katif”, in an area known as “al-Mawasi, according to Al-Khatib.
Project Unified Assistance said that this airport to be used by all Palestinians wishing to travel to and from the Gaza Strip. Additionally, and per the UN’s aviation model in other parts of the world, the airport will be available for use by UN staff and workers with various NGOs who are contributing to the humanitarian relief and reconstruction efforts.
At this time, the humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip is critical.
There are ongoing border closures, the reconstruction process has barely begun, tens of thousands remain displaced as a result of the 2014 war, patients with a variety of illnesses are unable to receive or travel for proper treatment, and the healthcare sector is suffering from chronic shortages and challenges. Hence, PUA’s proposal to establish an airport operated and regulated by the UN will not end the blockade of Gaza, nor will it solve the Strip’s problems, Al-Khatib concluded.
Edited by Chris Carlson, imemc.org
Five years ago, Ahmad Al-Khatib, the projects’ director, launched an initiative to establish a UN airport in Gaza, in an attempt the ease the livelihoods of Gazans living under blockade since ten years.
(PUA) is a US-based humanitarian nonprofit organization advocating the establishment of a UN operated and regulated airport in the Gaza Strip, according to Al Ray Palestinian Media Agency.
Al-Khatib assured that the idea is not extraordinary, adding that the United Nations operated, between 1956 and 1967, an airport in the Gaza Strip as a part of the United Nations Emergency Force, which was created in order to supervise the “disentanglement” of the armies of Egypt, Britain, France and Israel, in the Sinai Peninsula and the Gaza Strip.
Historical images show UN planes at the Gaza Airport, which served the UN Emergency Force and Gaza’s inhabitants. The use of the airport was expanded from military purposes to civilian applications whereby UN planes provided transportation services and carried passengers and humanitarian/commercial cargo to and from the Gaza Strip, Al-Khatib added.
Al-Khatib said that the UN airport may represent a window of hope of patients and students stuck in Gaza, and contributing to the reconstruction process.
A recent United Nations report warned that the Gaza Strip will be uninhabitable by 2020 for its 1.8 million residents.
According to the report, serious changes must be implemented to reverse the damage done to the coastal enclave’s development. Additionally, the World Bank warned, in May of 2016, that Gaza’s economy is on the verge of collapse and that youth unemployment is the highest in the region, at 60%. After years of war, destruction, and poverty, an airport for functional purposes could help accelerate Gaza’s reconstruction and redevelopment process. It would also relieve Gazans’ chronic inability to travel in and out of the Strip in an effective and safe manner, Al-Khatib highlighted.
Al-Khatib demonstrated the social, economic and political benefits of creating an independent travel mechanism that would allow Gazans to exit and enter the territory through a secure non-Egyptian and non-Israeli crossing.
The idea will develop a sound operations model and effective procedures for how the airport is to be operated by the United Nations with financial support from Arab, regional, and international stakeholders, he added.
PUA identified a new site that will allow airplanes to fly over Mediterranean and international waters, in order to avoid Israeli airspace. After detailed analysis, PUA proposes the construction of an airport on the southwestern coast of the Gaza Strip between the cities of Khan Younis and Rafah, on the grounds of the former Jewish settlement of “Gush Katif”, in an area known as “al-Mawasi, according to Al-Khatib.
Project Unified Assistance said that this airport to be used by all Palestinians wishing to travel to and from the Gaza Strip. Additionally, and per the UN’s aviation model in other parts of the world, the airport will be available for use by UN staff and workers with various NGOs who are contributing to the humanitarian relief and reconstruction efforts.
At this time, the humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip is critical.
There are ongoing border closures, the reconstruction process has barely begun, tens of thousands remain displaced as a result of the 2014 war, patients with a variety of illnesses are unable to receive or travel for proper treatment, and the healthcare sector is suffering from chronic shortages and challenges. Hence, PUA’s proposal to establish an airport operated and regulated by the UN will not end the blockade of Gaza, nor will it solve the Strip’s problems, Al-Khatib concluded.
Edited by Chris Carlson, imemc.org
22 july 2016
United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS) reached Thursday an agreement with the German government under the coordination of the German Development Bank (KfW) to rebuild 100 totally demolished houses in Gaza Strip.
UNOPS revealed in a statement issued Thursday that the German government will fund the reconstruction of nearly 100 houses in Gaza Strip with a cost of £5 million Euro.
The project will be implemented in coordination with the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) and the Ministry of Public Works.
The project is a part of the German £120 million Euro commitments to the reconstruction of Gaza, the statement pointed out.
UNOPS revealed in a statement issued Thursday that the German government will fund the reconstruction of nearly 100 houses in Gaza Strip with a cost of £5 million Euro.
The project will be implemented in coordination with the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) and the Ministry of Public Works.
The project is a part of the German £120 million Euro commitments to the reconstruction of Gaza, the statement pointed out.
Palestinian Ministry of Public Works and Housing Thursday handed out keys of 1060 apartments of Hamad City in Khan Younis to Gazan families affected by the Israeli aggression on Gaza in summer 2014.
Mufid al-Hasayna, Minister of Public Works and Housing, said that the families who took the apartments, within the first phase of the project, are of limited income.
He pointed out that a similar number of families will have their new homes ready by the beginning of next year. Hasayna said that there are over 25 housing towers being built in different locations in Gaza Strip, mostly within the Qatari and Turkish grants.
Another 5 housing towers funded by Saudi donation will be finished within a maximum period of three months, he revealed. The besieged Gaza Strip suffers from a housing shortage estimated at 130,000 housing units after the latest Israeli aggression.
The shortage was 75,000 units before the aggression. The families who received their new apartments thanked Qatar along with all of those who contributed to the construction of their homes.
Mufid al-Hasayna, Minister of Public Works and Housing, said that the families who took the apartments, within the first phase of the project, are of limited income.
He pointed out that a similar number of families will have their new homes ready by the beginning of next year. Hasayna said that there are over 25 housing towers being built in different locations in Gaza Strip, mostly within the Qatari and Turkish grants.
Another 5 housing towers funded by Saudi donation will be finished within a maximum period of three months, he revealed. The besieged Gaza Strip suffers from a housing shortage estimated at 130,000 housing units after the latest Israeli aggression.
The shortage was 75,000 units before the aggression. The families who received their new apartments thanked Qatar along with all of those who contributed to the construction of their homes.