Article74 Magazine

Israel’s policies regarding Palestinian residence in the Occupied Territories have amounted to summary deportation and quiet transfer since the occupation began in 1967. It is impossible to estimate how many Palestinians have been effectively transferred over this period. In some villages, for example people will tell that the actual population is 3,000 to 4,000, but that 1,500 or 2,000 are outside and unable to return. It is impossible to know how much migration was actually voluntary, how much by administrative fiat, and how much because conditions have been made so unpromising that people decided to live elsewhere. 

The situation of Palestinian residence in the Occupied Territories is one of crisis. The crisis, which has been a long time in the making, is also sharply delineated. It is multifaceted and complex, has both short and long-term implications, and is the product of both Israeli policy and such ordinary events as people reaching the age of marriage and childbearing. Some aspects of it are being dealt with or protested, others remain completely ignored. The following is an attempt to summarize the main aspects of the crisis: 

Since the 1967 census, the only way for people not included therein to obtain residence was through a process of family reunification. Originally, any family member could apply to have a person outside the country brought in. Later, the categories were narrowed. Only what Israeli law calls “first degree” relatives were allowed to apply: parents, spouses, siblings and children. Still later, only spouses were permitted. By the mid-1980’s, only husbands were permitted to apply for wives. 

Most of the wives, in fact, are cousins who, although originally from the same town or village, lack resident status. In these cases, the woman normally moves to the West Bank and the couple applies for family reunification. Usually they do not receive it and the wife and children travel back and forth between Jordan and the West Bank until the level of disruption, economic and otherwise, in their lives no longer permits this. Then the women remain in the West Bank on expired visitors’ permits. 
Wives and children in this category were the main victims (about 80%) of the dramatic summary transfer campaign in late 1989, when the Israeli military began rounding up people in the middle of the night, processing their cases at the local civil administration and summarily deporting them to Jordan. They were given 15 minutes to pack their clothing, obtain money and bid good-bye to loved ones. About 250 women, children and old people were deported in this way before the campaign was halted. Later, in June 1990, the Israeli High Court ruled that women married to residents and their children should be allowed to remain in the Territories on visitors’ permits without harassment and fear. These conditions have not been met: In August 1991, civil administrations in Nablus, Tulkarem, Ramallah and Bethlehem started administratively deporting women and children who had not renewed their visitors’ permits. This process was temporarily halted when ACRI and B’Tselem protested to Israel’s Legal Advisor. 

Since the beginning of the Intifada and following the crisis in the Gulf more and more Palestinians are (and will be) deprived of the right to live in their homeland: 

• Since September 1987, children whose mothers are not residents cannot be registered on their fathers’ ID card; i.e. they are not eligible to obtain residence in the future. 
• According to Israel’s Legal Advisor, the liberalizations regarding visitors’ permits are limited to women married to residents before the June 1990 High Court decision. Non-resident women marrying in the West Bank after this date are not protected and can be expelled. 
• Only “first degree” family members; parents, siblings, spouses and children, can now apply for a visitor permit for a relative. It is impossible for example, for a Palestinian to arrange a visit for a grandmother, cousin or aunt. 
• The family of anyone who comes to visit is forced to sign a NIS 5,000 guarantee that he or she will leave on the scheduled date. 
• Other groups whose basic residence rights are violated are: 
• People, especially the elderly, deported in 1989 and who are not permitted to return. 
• Palestinians who had worked in Kuwait and are prevented from returning to the Occupied Territories. 
• Non-Jerusalem residents who marry Jerusalem residents. These cases require family reunification, as though the resident were a foreigner. If the Jerusalem resident is the wife, the children are refused registration either in Jerusalem or in the West Bank, and are stateless. 
• Persons who lost their resident status due to loss of documents or prolonged stays abroad.