Gaza withdrawal

Dear Consul General,

Today Israel is expected to begin its much-publicised unilateral withdrawal – known as “Disengagement” – from the Gaza Strip and four settlements in the northern West Bank. Although the international community has generally perceived the withdrawal plan as an Israeli step towards peace and the respect of international law, it is in fact very doubtful that either of these goals will be met. The only certain result of the withdrawal plan to date is that it has muted the international community’s criticisms of Israeli violations in the Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT) and persistent obstruction of a just and durable solution to the Israeli - Palestinian conflict. Such obstructions include the continued building of the Annexation Wall, construction and expansion of settlements, and sustained efforts to formalise the de facto annexation of East Jerusalem.

The withdrawal plan, as it currently stands, will not lead to an end of the Israeli occupation of the OPT. Under international law, occupation ends when the Occupying Power no longer exercises effective control over a territory. The official Israeli withdrawal plan outlines the removal of settlers and permanent military presence from all of the Gaza Strip and four Israeli settlements in the West Bank, but reserves the option for Israel to militarily re-enter, at any given time, the areas from which it has withdrawn. Throughout the rest of the West Bank, settlements and permanent military presence will remain. As for Gaza, Israel will guard and monitor the external land perimeter of the Gaza Strip, will continue to maintain exclusive authority in Gaza air space, and will continue to exercise security activity in the sea off the coast of the Gaza Strip.

This falls short of ending the occupation, as Israeli forces remain in effective control of both the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Consequently, Israel’s duties and responsibilities as the Occupying Power in the OPT will continue until Israel effectively ends the occupation.

Consequently, the Occupying Power is under an obligation to effectively address the already rising levels of settler violence against Palestinians which Al-Haq anticipates will further increase during the operative phase of the withdrawal. Al-Haq also expresses its alarm over how the plan will be implemented. Senior Israeli officials have warned that any fire directed towards Israelis while carrying out the withdrawal will be met with a strong use of force that may escalate to a war-like situation. Al-Haq is deeply concerned that some Israeli opponents to the withdrawal may seek to obstruct it by causing confrontations that would trigger such a military response, which, in light of prior experience, is likely to include forms of collective punishment of the Palestinians. What should have been a withdrawal may then become a renewed invasion with further deterioration of the human rights situation.

Even if such a scenario is avoided, internal closures of the affected areas will accompany the withdrawal plan, entailing further deterioration of the social and economical situation of the already impoverished Palestinian population. After years of Israel obstructing or destroying the emergence of essential Palestinian infrastructure in the OPT, the systematic policy of closures must come to an end. Israel’s sealing off of the borders surrounding Gaza would have disastrous consequences for an economy that is already in a dire state.

Last but not least, Al-Haq is concerned that members of the international community have muted their criticisms or adapted their policies toward Israeli violations in the OPT in the name of what they perceive as the positive development of the unilateral withdrawal plan. Al-Haq emphatically draws the attention of the international community to a number of truths either forgotten or ignored:

The withdrawal would amount to evacuating approximately 8,500 out of a total of 425,000 Israeli settlers, corresponding to only 2 percent of the total settler population currently living in the OPT, including East Jerusalem. Since the plan was announced, the total number of settlers who have come to live in the West Bank exceeds that of the settlers expected to be evacuated under the plan.

The withdrawal plan promises that “Israel will continue building the Security Fence.” Israeli authorities thus continue to blatantly ignore the International Court of Justice’s Advisory Opinion on the Wall, which reflects Israel’s obligations under international law.

The withdrawal plan explicitly states that some areas of the West Bank “will be part of the State of Israel.” Consequently, the plan not only fails to end the occupation of the affected areas, it also does not even begin to address the occupation of the remaining and greater part of the OPT.

The evacuation of all settlements, the removal of the Wall and the end of the occupation of the OPT cannot be traded away in exchange for the withdrawal. A just and durable solution to the conflict cannot be achieved without the firm implementation and enforcement of international law, including the relevant UN resolutions. The more prolonged the occupation, the harder it will be to achieve such a solution. While the international community remains inactive, the fundamental rights of the Palestinian people are steadily chipped away.

As both High Contracting Parties to the Geneva Conventions and UN member states, Al-Haq urges you to act in accordance with your obligations under international law by monitoring the respect of international law in the Gaza Strip and in the northern parts of the West Bank during the withdrawal. Al-Haq also urges you to exercise your duty of vigilance regarding the remainder of the OPT where massive violations are taking place in the shadow of the “Disengagement Plan.”

Best regards,

Randa Siniora
General Director
Al Haq
Ramallah, West Bank