An large nine-judge panel of the High Court ruled unanimously
on Tuesday morning that the army was legally entitled to
relocate two relatives of a terrorist from the West Bank to
Gaza, because they helped him carry out the attacks. The
court said that the two who are being relocated can return to
the West Bank after two years.
The court blocked the deportation of a third Palestinian, on
the grounds that insufficient evidence had been presented to
prove he knew his relative was planning a terror attack.
The court accepted the position of the government that the
West Bank and Gaza are a single political entity, so that
forcing someone to go from one to the other is legally a
relocation and not a deportation, which might be illegal
under international law.
The court did not give the army carte blanche to carry out
relocations, saying that they could not be used broadly
against relatives of terror suspects but that the military
had to prove that those slated for relocation to Gaza had
advance knowledge or were involved in plotting the
attacks.
The court said in particular that the brother and sister
could be relocated as they had advance knowledge of the
attacks planned by their brother and it was shown "they were
involved in terrorism to the extent required such that they
presented a reasonable possibility of danger." The army had
said that the woman sewed the explosives belt used in one of
the attacks.
The judges said that the third defendant, whose brother
orchestrated two shooting attacks in which 17 Israelis were
killed, would not be deported because his involvement
amounted to "merely lending his brother a car and giving him
clean clothes and food at his home." The court said there was
"no connection between the petitioner's acts and the
terrorist activity of his brother."
"The court ruled with a loud voice that deterrence cannot be
a cause to take steps. This is a very, very positive point,"
said human rights lawyer, Leah Tzemel, who represented two of
the petitioners.
Palestinian officials denounced the decision, saying that the
Palestinian Authority might file a complaint with the United
Nations Security Council and the International Criminal
Court.
International attention has been focused on the case which
has pitted human rights arguments -- specifically that
deportation is a collective punishment and that the deportees
should be tried in a court of law -- against the military's
contention that this, along with house demolitions, is an
effective measure in deterring terror attacks.
State prosecutor Shay Nitzan expressed satisfaction with the
court's decision. "The court accepted the use of expulsion on
a fundamental level and ruled that there is a need to balance
human rights considerations with security considerations," he
said.
Nitzan added that expulsions could not be considered
deportation to a foreign country, but a form of relocation,
since the court had accepted the state's claim that the Gaza
Strip and the West Bank were one territorial unit.
The terrorist incidents mentioned in the case include the
attack on a bus near Immanuel and the Tisha B'Av bombing at
Tel Aviv's Neve Sha'anan, attacks that took 14 lives and
wounded dozens of people.
