Last November, the application of the Al Ghoul family, which seeks family reunification in Jerusalem, was formally denied by the Israeli authorities on the grounds of “security”. In May of this year, Attorney Lea Tsemel filed a petition with the Israeli High Court requesting the court to instruct the Ministry of the Interior to explain why Mrs. Al Ghoul should not be granted permanent resident status in Jerusalem immediately.  
Amin Al Ghoul is a Jerusalem resident. His wife, Majda, who lives with him in a small apartment in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Ras Al-Amud is officially registered as a resident of Bethlehem. They have four children. Amin was held in administrative detention in 1989 by the Israeli authorities because of his political activities.  
When the couple married, they immediately applied for family reunification. After they submitted their second application in 1991, Mr. Al Ghoul was visited by an agent of the Shabak (the General Security Services), who promised that the application would be approved ... if he agreed to become a collaborator and informer for the Israeli security services. He refused ... and so was the application for family reunification for his wife. The case is particularly distressing, because one of the Al Ghoul’s sons, Ma’en, suffers from a kidney failure. As Majda is not a “legal” resident of Jerusalem, she often experiences difficulties taking her son to the West Jerusalem hospital where he is being treated. Because of the urgent nature of this case, the Al Ghoul family has been “adopted” by the Family Reunification Project of the American Friends Service Committee in Chicago, which has started a public campaign around the issue.  
Attorney Tsemel states in the petition that the refusal of the Interior Ministry to grant the application was not based on an independent exercise of discretion, according to the pertinent criteria, but was due to arbitrary, irrelevant and political criteria, under the influence of the Shabak. The Israeli authorities themselves have stated that a “security check” only applies to the one seeking permanent resident status, not to the resident spouse. Unfortunately, this case is not an isolated instance of the arbitrary use of “security” claims to deny family reunification. ARTICLE 74 will keep its readers informed of the disposition of the case before the High Court.