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Israeli top legal official rules Jerusalem land seizure illegal

By: Ahmed Hammadi

HELD JERUSALEM: Israel's Attorney General Meni Mazuz has ordered Premier Ariel Sharon's government to call an immediate halt to confiscating Palestinian property in East Jerusalem under a five-decades-old law, while a report disclosed that Israel detained 1,000 Palestinian minor children during the last four years.

According to Mazuz he was never consulted about the policy, which was secretly approved by the cabinet last summer.

He wrote to the finance minister saying the law could not be used for people absent from their property because of Israeli security measures.

The legislation entitles Israel to take Arab-owned land without compensation.

Palestinians say the cabinet decision was meant to allow the takeover of thousands of hectares of Palestinian-owned land around Jerusalem and cement Israel's control over the occupied eastern half of the city.

Lawyers for Palestinian landowners say hundreds of hectares have been seized in recent months.

The United States has expressed concern about Israel's decision to apply the 1950 Absentee Property Law after it was brought to light last month.

A meeting between top Israeli envoy Dov Weisglass and US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is thought to have discussed the issue on Monday.

Talking to journalists, justice ministry spokesman Jacob Galanti said Mazuz ruled that reviving the long-dormant law was illegal.

“Mazuz gave his opinion to ministers that this decision is not legally defensible, that it cannot stand up to either Israeli or international law,” he said.

The law was originally devised to expropriate property belonging to the hundreds of thousands of Palestinians who fled their homes during the conflict that accompanied the creation of Israel in 1948.

The Palestinian Detainees Club in its report pointed out that 350of 1,000 still remain in Israeli jails and detention camps in various parts of Israel. The youngest of the detainees, says the report, is 14-year-old Ghada Abu Hameed, who is detained along with 15 other girls who had not reached the age of maturity.

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