On 31 May 2021, Al-Haq and partners submitted four written submissions ahead of the upcoming 47th regular session of the United Nations (UN) Human Rights Council, which will be held between 21 June and 15 July 2021. Addressing the Council under different agenda items, the organisations highlighted Israel’s widespread and systematic attacks committed against the Palestinian people, including suspected crimes, which warrant international investigation and accountability. The four submissions addressed Israel’s ongoing dispossession of Palestinians, repression of Palestinian protesters, and its systematic arbitrary arrests and detention campaigns, on both sides of the Green Line, the failure to annually update the UN database of businesses operating in Israeli settlements, and Israel’s entrenchment of its settler-colonial and apartheid regime over the Palestinian people as a whole.
- Joint written submission on the need to take effective measures to ensure accountability amidst escalating Israeli attacks against the Palestinian people
Under Item 9, Al-Haq, Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies (CIHRS), Al Mezan Center for Human Rights (Al Mezan), and the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR) urged the Council and its Member States to pursue international justice and accountability for Israel’s widespread and systematic human rights violations perpetrated against the Palestinian people, including the crime of apartheid, by activating universal jurisdiction mechanisms and supporting a full, thorough, and comprehensive investigation by the International Criminal Court into the Situation in Palestine without any further delay.
Addressing the imminent threat of having Palestinian families of Sheikh Jarrah and Batn-Al Hawa neighbourhood in Jerusalem forcibly transferred, after settler organisations filed eviction cases against them in Israeli courts, the organisations underlined how this threat is only one of the latest examples of Israel’s longstanding policies to displace and dispossess Palestinians, and one of many tools used by Israel to impose, maintain, and further expand and entrench its settler-colonial and apartheid regime over the Palestinian people as a whole.
The submission further underscored the need for the international community to address Israel’s policies and practices targeting the Palestinian people as a whole as “one comprehensive regime developed for the purpose of ensuring the enduring domination over non-Jews,” in order to effectively address the root causes of Israel’s settler colonialism and apartheid regime and ensure accountability for violations of international human rights law and international humanitarian law. In this context, the written submission underlined the critical role of the historic resolution adopted by the Council during its 30th Special Session which established a standing Commission of Inquiry in addressing Israel’s latest and ongoing violations against the Palestinian people on both sides of the Green Line while also addressing the root causes, “including systematic discrimination and repression based on national, ethnic, racial or religious identity.”
Read the full joint written submission here.
- Joint written submission on Israel’s continuous repression of Palestinians challenging Israel’s domination and oppression on both sides of the Green Line
Submitted by Al-Haq, Al Mezan, PCHR, and CIHRS under Item 7, the joint written submission addressed Israel’s repression of widespread Palestinian demonstrations on both sides of the Green Line, which erupted in May 2021 against Israel’s imminent threat of forcibly transferring eight Palestinian families from their homes in the Sheikh Jarrah neighbourhood in Jerusalem. The demonstrations have crystalised around this latest example of Israel’s institutionalised regime of racial domination and oppression, which the Palestinian people have endured for decades.
The joint submission highlighted how Israel, and its occupying forces, police, and settlers have violently repressed and attacked Palestinian demonstrations in the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and inside the Green Line, violating the Palestinian right to peaceful protest and freedom of expression. The demonstrations have been met with unnecessary, disproportionate and excessive use of force, resulting in the killing of Palestinians from both sides of the Green Line. Within the same context, the organisations highlighted how the Israeli occupying forces have denied and attacked ambulances and paramedics from reaching injured civilians; preventing them from treating injuries, and attacked, and in some cases, arrested journalists, preventing them from reporting news on the ground.
Overall, the joint submission reaffirmed that Israel continues to use its arms industry and systematic shoot-to-kill policy with the aim to maintain its apartheid regime of systematic racial oppression and domination over the Palestinian people as a whole. The organisations further stressed that the continuous killing of Palestinians, including Palestinian protesters on both sides of the Green Line, is a direct result stemming from the climate of impunity granted by the Israeli occupying authorities and its judicial system, which prevent and undermine accountability and redress for Palestinians.
Read the full joint written submission here.
- Joint written submission on Israel’s escalation of systematic arbitrary arrests and detention campaigns against Palestinians on both sides of the Green Line
Al-Haq, Addameer Prisoner Support and Human Rights Association, Al Mezan, PCHR, and CIHRS submitted a joint written submission under Item 7 on Israel’s latest large-scale campaign of systematic arbitrary arrest and detention of Palestinians on both sides of the Green Line. Affirming that these arrests are a continuation of a long-established policy used to intimidate and silence Palestinians, the submission further highlighted that these campaigns, carried out on both sides of the Green Line, are upheld by Israel’s apartheid judicial system, which systematically grants impunity to Israeli occupying forces, police, and settlers, while upholding indictments submitted against Palestinian detainees and ignoring evidence of their physical assault.
Between 24 and 25 May 2021, Israeli police carried out a retaliatory campaign of mass arbitrary arrests against Palestinians in Jerusalem and inside the Green Line, under the announced “Operation Law and Order.” In its statement, the Israeli police highlighted that the aim of this campaign is “to settle the score” with Palestinians for their political positions and activities. Dr. Hassan Jabareen, General Director of Adalah said “These raids are intended to intimidate and to exact revenge on Palestinian citizens of Israel – ‘to settle the score’ with Palestinians, in the Israeli police’s own words – for their political positions and activities.” At least 250 Palestinians were detained in those two days, with a particular focus on demonstrators, activists, and minors.
On the other side of the Green Line, in the occupied West Bank, a campaign of arbitrary arrests began on 4 May 2021 and intensified on 12 May 2021, targeting freed prisoners, activists, and politicians. On 12 May alone, nearly 60 Palestinians, including journalists, activists, and candidates for the Palestinian Legislative Council were arrested. Overall, between 13 April and 26 May 2021, around 550 Palestinians in the West Bank, including 38 children, two journalists, six candidates for the PLC, and two former PLC members, were arrested in night raids that included the storming of their houses, attacks on family, and property destruction by the IOF. At the same time, Israel issued 155 administrative detention orders between 1-26 May 2021, including 84 new administrative orders, including eight Jerusalemites and two children.
The joint submission further reaffirmed the complicity of Israel’s judicial system in maintaining its apartheid regime, and urged the Council and its Member States recognise that in the context of the commission of the crime of apartheid, Israel persecutes Palestinian “organizations and persons, by depriving them of fundamental rights and freedoms, because they oppose apartheid”. Palestinian’s who mobilise to challenge Israel’s policies, laws and practices of racial domination and oppression, are met with harassment, arbitrary detention, torture, and other ill-treatment on both sides of the Green Line.
Read the full joint written submission here.
- Joint written submission on the UN database and its cruciality for corporate accountability, amid ongoing settlement expansion and escalating attacks against Palestinians
Under Item 7, CIHRS, Al-Haq, Al Mezan, and PCHR submitted a joint written submission addressing the importance of the annual update of the UN database of businesses involved in Israel’s settlement enterprise. Constituting a practical and effective transparency tool, the UN database ensures that corporations do not continue to benefit from a situation of prolonged occupation and injustice without taking the risk of being listed in the UN database and strengthens the implementation of international law and standards, including the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights to situations of occupation.
While recognising that budgetary constraints are an issue facing the UN’s work, the joint submission urged the OHCHR to implement all mandates entrusted to it in a non-selective manner, underlining that our organisations know of no other mandates entrusted to the OHCHR which were indefinitely suspended due to budgetary constraints.
Israel’s illegal settlement enterprise, which constitutes a fundamental policy and root cause driving the continuation and intensification of grave violations of the rights of Palestinian people including the rights to self-determination and control over national wealth and resources. The written submission addressed how the UN has failed to take sufficient action to ensure deterrence or accountability for Israel’s settlement enterprise, and urged the Council and its Member States to ensure the completion and publication of the 2021 update to the UN database as mandated by HRC 31/36.
Read the full joint written submission here.
Overall, all written submissions urged the Council and its Member States to recognise and condemn Israel’s settler-colonial and apartheid regime imposed over the Palestinian people as whole, and called for international justice and accountability for Israel’s widespread and systematic human rights violations committed against the Palestinian people, including war crimes and crimes against humanity, including through supporting of the annual updating of the UN database and a full, thorough, and comprehensive investigation by the International Criminal Court into the Situation in Palestine without any further delay.