Posted on: May 9, 2007
By World Bank Technical Team
Introduction
1. Restrictions on movement in areas of the West Bank outside of East Jerusalem have
traditionally been measured by the number of physical impediments such as checkpoints, roadblocks and gates present at any given time As monitored by the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in the Occupied Territories (OCHA), in the year between the advent of the AMA and November 2006, the number of physical impediments in the West Bank increased by some 44% despite commitments to the contrary. In March 2007, OCHA reported that physical impediments were even slightly higher again (546 in March 2007 vs. 540 in November 2006). Typically, the parties have sought improvement by concentrating efforts to remove certain physical impediments on the basis that a number of them were unnecessary or redundant from a security perspective and created unwarranted hardship on the Palestinian population. However, because of the difficulty in verification and the ease by which physical impediments can be removed in one form and reinstated in another, a count of physical impediments fails to give a full picture of the impact of restrictions. This was underlined by the admission by the IDF in January 2007 that forty-four impediments it claimed to have removed as part of a plan to ease movement did not actually exist. Moreover, analyzing movement restrictions solely on the basis of physical impediments overlooks the imposition of administrative obstacles which are one of the most potent means for restricting Palestinian movement and access.
2. GOI’s control of the Palestinian population registry, which allows it to issue ID cards and determine the place of residence of every Palestinian in WB&G over the age of 16, is at the core of the system of administrative obstacles. The population registry also supports the permit system which can be used to control nearly all facets of Palestinian movement outside of an individual’s immediate village or municipal area. Permits are used to restrict Palestinian access to large areas of the West Bank including East Jerusalem, the Jordan Valley, Settlement Areas, and the “seam zone”, as well as access to and movement between Areas A, B and C.
3. Under occupation, administrative restrictions on movement are defined and implemented by orders of the Military Commander of the West Bank. These orders, which are published and have the effect of law, are then supplemented by ad hoc measures which are communicated verbally to Palestinians, but which are not supported by published rules or procedures. Together, military orders and ad hoc measures create a system of movement restrictions which is non-transparent and highly unpredictable. As shown in maps developed by OCHA (see Annex 1), the combined effect of physical and administrative obstacles is the division of the West Bank into three segments (north, central, south) and additionally ten segments or enclaves, with Palestinians channeled through manned checkpoints in order to move between the trisections and in and out of the enclaves. The practical effect of this shattered economic space is that on any given day the ability to reach work, school, shopping, healthcare facilities and agricultural land is highly uncertain and subject to arbitrary restriction and delay. In economic terms, the restrictions have created a level of uncertainty and inefficiency which has made the normal conduct of business extremely difficult and therefore has stymied the growth and investment which is necessary to fuel economic revival.
II. ADMINISTRATIVE IMPEDIMENTS
Control of the Population Registry
- In June 1967, GOI carried out a census of residents in WB&G and only those who were present in the territories at that time were registered in the Palestinian population registry, recognized as legal residents and provided with identification cards. From that time to the present, GOI has retained full control of the population registry despite the fact that the Oslo Accords required that GOI transfer control of the population registry, along with other civil matters, to the PA for Areas A and B. In practical terms, this means that any change of residence within the West Bank or Gaza, or between the two territories, for purposes of marriage, education or employment must be approved by GOI. Even after its disengagement from Gaza, Israel retained control of the registry and uses it to restrict movement. For example, only persons listed in the population registry, or issued permits by GOI, can use the Rafah crossing to enter into Egypt. Gazan residents are almost never allowed to live in the West Bank even in cases of marriage or to attend higher education. For the vast majority of Palestinians, even visiting between Gaza and the West Bank is prohibited. Only those with special permits – normally VIPs, high level government officials and certain business people – can travel between the two Palestinian territories. Approvals for movement between East Jerusalem and the rest of WB&G are likewise problematic.
Permit Regime
- In addition to holding an ID card, Palestinians are often required to obtain permits for nearly all movement outside of their greater municipal area. Permit requirements are rarely published and are highly changeable. The system operates on two levels – one to control movement within the West Bank itself and another for movement across what GOI defines as “boundaries”. These include mandatory permits for WB&G ID-holders to access East Jerusalem, for East Jerusalem ID-holders to access other areas of WB&G; permits for Gazan residents to access the West Bank and for West Bank residents to access Gaza and for all non-residents of the Jordan Valley to freely access that area.1 Palestinians who enter settlement areas (normally only Palestinian laborers who work in the settlements) are also required to obtain permits. All WB&G residents require permission to enter Israel. Israeli citizens are generally prohibited from entering Gaza or Area A in the West Bank.
- For movement within the West Bank, permit requirements are more fluid and obstacles can change from day to day. For example, movement in the northern governorates of the West Bank is currently heavily restricted, particularly around Nablus. There have been periods within the past year when GOI instituted a ban on all males between the ages of 16 and 35 from leaving the area. Such requirements are normally ad hoc and lack a formal system for notification. Palestinians typically learn of the restriction only when stopped by IDF soldiers at a given checkpoint, as movement restrictions requiring permits are usually communicated by verbal orders. Moreover, permits are valid only for individuals — private, public and commercial vehicles need separate permits, whether or not the driver is permitted.
- The permit system is enforced by physical impediments which funnel Palestinians through permanent and/or “flying” checkpoints where soldiers determine whether a permit is needed or whether a permit held by a Palestinian is valid. Holding a valid permit does not necessarily guarantee the ability to cross a checkpoint. Requirements can be changed without notice at particular checkpoints and comprehensive closures, banning all movement, can be imposed at any time. According to B’Tselem, in 2006 there were 78 days on which comprehensive closures were imposed. While some of these closures occur because of a specific or perceived security threat, others do not. For example, there are typically blanket closures in the West Bank during public holidays in Israel. Unsurprisingly, these restrictions make the movement of people and goods more expensive, inefficient and unpredictable and therefore have a particularly chilling effect on economic activity. Beyond the personal hardship, an economy cannot run effectively if there is significant uncertainty about the ability of workers to reach their jobs, of goods reaching their markets, and of entrepreneurs being present to manage their place of business.
Family Unification and Establishment of Residency
- Persons not listed in the population registry who wish to legally join their families and permanently reside in the West Bank can only do so through the approval of GOI for family
unification. However, according to GOI, family unification in the West Bank is not a vested right based on fundamental rights to family, but instead is a “special benevolent act of the Israeli authorities”. Following the start of the second intifada, GOI stopped processing requests for family unification and stopped issuing visitor permits to non-resident family members. The PA Ministry of Civil Affairs estimates that there have been some 120,000 requests for family unification since the start of the second intifada. This is in addition to the thousands of cases which were pending when the freeze began. Since then, requests have only been granted to “exceptional humanitarian cases” although criteria for this category has never been well defined and the wait for a substantive response from GOI concerning residency requests normally takes several years. This treatment of Palestinians in the West Bank is in contrast to the treatment of those who wish to take up residency in West Bank settlements. In the latter case, residency in settlements is open not only to Israeli citizens but to all foreign citizens eligible for citizenship in Israel under the Israeli Law of Return.
- GOI has not made public the number of pending family unification applications. However one study estimates that roughly 17% of WB&G families are affected to the extent that a first-degree relative (parent, spouse, sibling or son/daughter) is not registered in the population registry and therefore cannot receive an identification card. Of this 17%, nearly 80% have filed unification requests and are still awaiting an official response. Because no set procedure exists to obtain residency, family members and other Palestinians who return to WB&G have had to depend on continually renewing three-month tourist visas. In some cases, persons have remained with their families for decades by leaving the country every three months to renew and then reenter WB&G on a tourist visa. Beginning in April of 2006, however, even this coping mechanism became more difficult as GOI began denying entry to many overseas Palestinians for family or business purposes even with a visa. This policy was directed at those who had invested in WB&G and who operated businesses there, those working for Palestinian governmental bodies, academic institutions and NGOs, as well as returning or visiting family members. In March 2007 GOI issued new rules which allow family members to extend their visitors permit up to a year, with a maximum coverage of 27 months, during which time the visitor must receive a WB&G ID without which they would have no legal basis to remain. There also remains considerable uncertainty whether a person will be allowed entry even with a valid visitor’s visa.
- According to the presidents of eleven Palestinian universities, thousands of foreign passport holders of Palestinian descent, along with non-Palestinian family members, lecturers, NGO workers and international development specialists were affected by these new procedures. Up to fifty percent of foreign instructors at Birzeit University in Ramallah alone were reportedly denied entry between May and September 2006. Foreign students are also at risk since they too have to enter only on tourist visas – and tourist visas do not cover the entire semester. Such limitations risk lowering the high education standards that have historically been an important area of strength for the Palestinian economy.
- The US Government lodged a protest with GOI stating that the US Government found it “hard to understand” discrimination against US citizens based on their ethnicity, especially as the US Government encouraged Palestinians to return to, and invest in WB&G in order to facilitate economic growth. Given that the vast majority of new investment in WB&G since the signing of the Oslo Accords has been through overseas Palestinians, such practices and the high degree of uncertainty connected to them will inevitably lead to a loss of foreign investment and knowledge transfer and a further contraction of the Palestinian economy.
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Source:
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