COMMITTEE ON ECONOMIC, SOCIAL AND CULTURAL RIGHTS CONTINUES REVIEW OF REPORT OF ISRAEL

AFTERNOON
HR/ESC/98/26
17 November 1998




Panel Queries Government Delegation on Bypass Roads
in Occupied Arab Territories; Role of Jewish Organizations

The Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights carried on this afternoon with consideration of an initial report from Israel, discussing at length whether or not the World Zionist Organization (WZO) and the Jewish Agency for Israel (JAFI), which received tax benefits from the Government and offered housing and other services for immigrants on State land, were discriminatory in that they helped only Jews; and whether the building and management of bypass roads to Jewish settlements in the occupied Arab territories was discriminatory.

Israeli Government representatives stated that organizations other than the WZO and JAFI received tax breaks, although not the same ones, and that the groups' activities amounted to a kind of affirmative action for poverty-stricken Jews arriving in Israel. They denied that such activities were discriminatory. Several Committee members, however, said the close relationship between the organizations and the Government and the fact that Jews were the exclusive beneficiaries seemed unfair.

The Israeli delegation said the building of the bypass roads had resulted from the Middle East peace negotiations and was intended to help security. Committee members expressed concern that the roads, which on occasion were built on land expropriated from Palestinians, sometimes were closed to Palestinian traffic yet kept open for use by Jewish settlers.

Other Committee questions dealt with shutdowns in traffic between the occupied territories and Israel and whether or not they interfered with Palestinians' right to work; with declines in union membership; and with rising unemployment in the country.

As one of 137 States parties to the Covenant, Israel must provide periodic reports to the Committee on efforts to put the treaty into effect.

The Israeli delegation appearing before the Committee included Malkiel Blass, of the High Court of Justice Division of the State Attorney's Office, Ministry of Justice; Michael Atlan, Head of Department, Legal Adviser's Office, Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs; and Alexandre Galilee, Deputy Permanent Representative of the Israeli Permanent Mission to the United Nations Office at Geneva.

Speaking at the meeting were Committee members Virginia Bonoan-Dandan, Maria de los Angeles Jimenez Butragueno, Walid M. Sa’di, Abdessatar Grissa, Eibe Reidel, Ade Adekuoye, Philippe Texier, Dumitru Ceausu, Mahmoud Samir Ahmed, Oscar Ceville, and Nutan Thapalia.

The panel will complete its examination of the Israeli report when it meets at 10 a.m. on Wednesday, 18 November.

Discussion

The Committee followed up on a list of 44 questions prepared in advance and to which the Israeli Government already had submitted written replies. The questions fell under the general categories of discrimination; employment; and entry limitations such as closure of the occupied territories and their effects on economic, social and cultural rights.

Committee members asked, among other things, how land used for bypass roads in the occupied Arab territories was acquired by Israel; whether in fact anyone could use the roads, as Israel had indicated in its written replies, since apparently the roads could be and had been closed to Palestinians; if ultra-religious Jewish groups in Israel were receiving special treatment such as tax breaks and the right to opt out of military service; whether the World Zionist Organization (WZO) and the Jewish Agency for Israel (JAFI), private organizations that received special status and tax benefits from the Government, were discriminatory in their operations as they provided services exclusively to Jews; if other organizations existed to deal with the special housing needs of Israel's non-Jewish communities; and if such organizations enjoyed similar tax advantages, exemptions, or such Government privileges as large tracts of State land for their use.

Committee members also asked if closures of checkpoints blocking access between the occupied territories and Israel interfered with Palestinians' right to work; what was being done to improve employment rates and unequal wages for women; why union membership in Israel had fallen from 1.8 million to 450,000 in recent years; what had caused recent increases in unemployment in Israel and if it was considered that the rightward shift of the Government and the paralysis in the Middle East peace negotiations were factors in increasing unemployment; if the right to strike was being restricted or denied; and what happened to Israeli settlements during closures of the occupied territories -- if there was discriminatory treatment in the sense that Jews living there were allowed to circulate while Palestinians were prevented from doing so; and if rates of child labour were increasing.

MICHAEL ATLAN, Head of Department, Legal Adviser's Office, Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs, of Israel, said, among other things, that equal opportunity laws applied to Government as well as private firms in terms of employment; there had been attempts to create new posts in the civil service to increase the number of Arabs employed in the civil service, and that the number had increased substantially in recent years; that a number of workshops had been held to help women apply for and seek jobs; that it was a kind of affirmative action to help a portion of the population that had been discriminated against; similarly the Government had offered a number of programmes to try to attract members of the ultra-orthodox sector of the population to the work force -- that also was a kind of affirmative action, and he did not see that such an approach was damaging to others; the ultra-orthodox made up a great part of the poor in Israel and it was hoped that such efforts could reduce poverty in the country; that foreign workers' permits were limited to their specific employers for purposes of control and to help Israeli citizens find employment first -- the intent was to limit foreign employees to jobs where there was truly a need for them, and not at the expense of Israeli citizens in a country where unemployment rates often were high; that the process had been reviewed repeatedly to ensure it did not lead to mistreatment of such workers; that the practice had been explained to the International Labour Office and had been accepted by it; that the inequality of wages between men and women had led to a revision of a law on equal pay; that the right to strike was used all the time; that the recent rise in unemployment was partly a result of the policy of the Government -- whether the Government was right or left, it was trying hard to cut inflation, and dramatic steps had been taken with apparent effects on unemployment.

MALKIEL BLASS, of the High Court of Justice Division of the State Attorney's Office, Ministry of Justice, Israel, responding to questions, said, among other things, that the Supreme Court had in fact ruled in favour of Palestinians on various occasions, despite claims to the contrary in some literature published about the country; that in any case, focusing only on Supreme Court rulings could be misleading, since many cases involving claims of discrimination against the Government never came to a decision, as the Government did not contest them and instead changed its policy; that other non-profit organizations besides the WZO and the JAFI received tax exemptions, although probably not the same treatment from the Government; that the two organizations were dedicated to helping Jews from all over the world, especially those at risk, and to bringing them to Israel, and to supplying them with basic housing and other needs; that the State alone could not have done this job but instead had depended on the organizations, which funded their activities with donations from Jews throughout the world; that he did not see these activities as discriminatory in relation to non-Jews.

Mr. Blass said that the State was still responsible for meeting the economic, social and cultural needs of all citizens under the terms of the Covenant; if another organization had applied for the same exemptions, Israeli authorities would have to examine the specifics of the request and function of the organization, and one could not say in advance what the result would be; that in any case there were different laws involving immigration of Jews and immigration of others; that there was a right for every Jew to come and live in Israel -- that was one of the reasons for Israel's existence; that there were organizations that assisted Arabs in Israel and did not assist Jews and no one claimed that was discriminatory; that bypass roads were indeed open to everyone, Palestinians and Jewish settlers alike; that it was true that sometimes the roads were closed for security reasons -- sometimes closed to all, sometimes closed to Palestinians, but such closures were applied from time to time to all roads; that the land for the bypass roads was acquired under terms of peace negotiations with the Palestinians and had been seen during the negotiations as a necessity; that the roads had been built through public procedures involving hearings and discussion, and if land was expropriated from private owners proper procedures were followed; compensation was paid; that it was important to consider that a country that was under threat from some elements in the Palestinian population in the West Bank and Gaza strip was still opening every day its borders to about 60,000 legal Palestinian workers; that there was no quota on the number of Palestinians who could work in Israel; that there were security restrictions, including checks of the backgrounds of workers; that in addition it appeared that some 30,000 or 40,000 illegal Palestinian workers came daily to Israel, and that some 15,000 Palestinians worked in Israeli settlements; that another 21,000 Palestinians had permits to enter Israel as merchants; that it was not easy for the country to allow so many workers at times of security risk, but that the country felt that the benefits to Palestinians were too great to be denied; and that restrictions on entry had been kept as loose as possible even at times of high unemployment in Israel.