October 1996, p. 56

Human Rights

Seattle Community Aids Bedouin

When an Episcopal church near Seattle, WA, sent money to help the Bedouin in Israel, parishioners didn’t realize they would be entering one of the longest running problems in the Middle East.

Last summer, St. Thomas Episcopal Church in Medina, WA, sent a donation to help education efforts on behalf of Bedouin children. Along with the donation, parishioners sent a church newsletter that happened to contain information on a fund-raising drive by the Washington church to build a new roof. Weeks later the church—located in one of the wealthiest areas in the United States—received a donation of 150 New Israeli shekels ($42) from the Bedouin to help fund the roof project. The gesture by the impoverished Bedouin made headlines in the Seattle area.

Just days later, the Medina, WA, recipients were shocked to learn that the Bedouin with whom they exchanged gifts were being evicted from their homes in the town of Laqiya in the Negev desert. The Laqiya tribe are victims of an Israeli program to move Bedouin in order to make room for Jewish developments. The same fate has befallen the Jahalin Bedouin near Jerusalem, who faced forced eviction to allow the expansion of the Ma’ale Adumim Jewish settlement east of Jerusalem (see July 1996 Washington Report, p. 65).

Human rights groups in Israel have tried for years to slow or stop the relocation of Bedouin tribes that have called the area home for centuries. The issue was the subject of an Israeli High Court case last spring. The case did not end favorably for the Bedouin, however, who are being pushed from areas in which they now live to areas that lack water, electricity and sewage systems.

The people of Medina still consider the Laqiya Bedouin their “sister” community, and they are continuing to raise funds for the Bedouin Early Education Project.

Donations for the Bedouin may be sent to Charlotte Ellis, c/o St. Mark’s, 1245 10th Ave. E., Seattle, WA 98102 or call (206)-454-2737.

—Geoff Lumetta

Human Rights Lawyers Arrested in Algeria and Tunisia

Human rights groups are protesting the arrest of two prominent human rights lawyers, Rachid Mesli of Algeria and Khemais Chammari of Tunisia. Although the cases are unrelated, they mark a further deterioration of the civil and human rights climate in these North African Arab countries.

According to a report released by the Lawyers Committee for Human Rights, Rachid Mesli was abducted from his car by four armed men in civilian clothes near Algiers on July 31. His whereabouts remained unknown for a week until his home, office and parents’ house were searched by uniformed police. At this time, Mesli’s parents were notified of his arrest.

Mesli was taken before an examining magistrate on Aug. 10, when he was accused of having links with armed groups. The magistrate approved his further detention and he remains in El-Harrache prison near Algiers. Witnesses at the hearing for Mesli said he bore bruises on this right eye and on his hand and appeared to be in poor physical condition.

Amnesty International reported on Mesli’s abduction and added that over the last four years, tens of thousands of people have been killed or arrested by security forces and armed opposition groups in Algeria.

In Tunisia, Khemais Chammari received a five-year prison sentence July 17 on charges of leaking secret information to foreign powers and threatening national security. Chammari, a well-known human rights advocate and parliamentarian, was a founder of the Arab Institute for Human Rights.

Human rights groups believe Chammari’s arrest stems from his efforts to defend a government opposition leader, Mohammed Chammari, who is serving an 11-year prison sentence. Chammari was arrested in October 1995 following the publication of a letter from his Social Democratic Party (MDS) to the president of Tunisia criticizing the absence of democracy in the country and the widespread denial of basic freedoms, according to the Lawyers Committee on Human Rights.

In addition to criminal prosecution, Chammari and his wife, also a lawyer, were subjected to constant police surveillance and obstructed from traveling outside the country, and their daughter received threats, according to the Lawyers Committee. Despite a public statement in which Chammari praised the Tunisian government’s democratic achievements, he was convicted and sentenced. On being taken into detention on May 18, Chammari had charged publicly that the measures taken against him and his family were “from the outset an act of intimidation.”

Both Amnesty and the Lawyer’s Committee are contacting local governments and international bodies to obtain the release of these individuals.

—Geoff Lumetta

Likud Steps Up House Demolitions

The Christian Peacemaker Teams (CPT) stationed in Hebron reported the continued demolition of Palestinian homes by Israel Defense Forces (IDF) in August. Palestinian houses also were bulldozed in the West Bank town of Nablus and in areas surrounding Jerusalem. Most of the buildings have been termed illegal by Israeli authorities because the owners do not have building permits.

At 10 a.m. on Aug. 6, the house of Idrees Pasmoul Al-Mutoor and his family of 13 was destroyed without warning, according to a CPT report. The house was located in the village of Bet-Anon near Hebron. The owner was told that the house had to be removed to make way for a road. CPT members question this explanation because the house is located on a steep, rocky hill a quarter-mile from the recently completed bypass road in Hebron. The group added that four nearby families have been warned that their houses are scheduled for demolition soon.

In April 1996, the Israeli government announced its plans to demolish 60 homes in the Hebron area. Due to protests by human rights and other international groups, then- Prime Minister Shimon Peres canceled the demolition plans. CPT members, however, fear that the new Likud government under Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu has reversed this decision. The Palestinian Society for the Protection of Human Rights and the Environment (LAWE) reports that demolitions are continuing in other areas of the West Bank as well. LAWE reported that six homes were demolished in the Jerusalem municipality on Aug. 12 for not having a building permit. Two other homes in Anata and Jaba’ villages, also near Jerusalem, were destroyed to make way for the Jewish-only by-pass road that will go from Ramallah to the northern Jerusalem settlement of Pisgat Ze’ev.

LAWE said that Palestinians are increasingly demoralized by the demolitions and other Likud policies.

“At a time when confidence has sunk to a low in the ongoing Oslo process, the double-standard of Israeli policy...further destabilizes the situation,” LAWE said in a public statement. “[The demolitions] highlight more clearly than anything else the aim of the current Israeli administration to limit the Palestinian population to tiny reservation-style areas.”

YWCA Says Israeli Policies Harming Women

Closures of the West Bank and Gaza have held particularly harsh consequences for women and their families, according to a recent study made by the World Young Women’s Christian Association (YWCA). A YWCA delegation found that Palestinian women were being denied access to health care, education, employment and places of worship due to the Israeli restrictions on travel to and from occupied territories.

Led by World YWCA President Anita Andersson of Sweden, the delegation included YWCA national presidents from North America, Europe, Africa and Asia. The group called on Israel to “immediately and fully” lift the closure of the West Bank and Gaza Strip, which it says is causing “severe economic hardship” for women and preventing many from receiving urgently needed medical treatment. The YWCA reported an incident where a pregnant woman was forced to give birth at a checkpoint because she was not allowed to cross into Israel to deliver her children in a hospital. Her new-born twins died at the checkpoint. Another infant with a treatable respiratory disease also died while being held up at a checkpoint, according to the YWCA report.

Although Israel partially lifted the closure, travel is still difficult for many Palestinians.

“The restrictions on traveling from one Palestinian city to another are keeping women prisoners in their own towns and preventing them from reaching their jobs, schools and medical facilities for treatment,” said World YWCA General Secretary Elaine Hesse Steel. “Palestinian women now have the challenge to attain equal participation in the governing of their society, but the closure and restricted access to Jerusalem have prevented them from networking and participating.”

In response to the delegation’s report, the World YWCA will request its members in 95 countries to demand that their own governments pressure the Israelis to end the continuing confiscation of Palestinian land and the expansion of Israeli settlements. It also is calling for the full implementation of the Oslo accords. Under the terms of the agreement, the YWCA said, the women living in substandard conditions in Israeli jails should have been released months ago.

The group members also discussed their concerns with high-ranking Palestinian and Israeli officials including Faisal Husseini, PLO Executive Committee member responsible for Jerusalem, and Israeli Knesset members Naomi Blumenthal (Likud) and Yael Dayan (Labor).

—Geoff Lumetta