High Court allows Palestinians to use Israeli highway
Second time in months Supreme Court orders the military to open roads deemed off-limits to Palestinians.
By Tomer Zarchin Tags: Israel newsThe High Court of Justice on Tuesday accepted a petition to allow Palestinians access to Israeli Highway 443, which runs through the West Bank and was previously deemed off limits to them.
The Association for Human Rights in Israel filed the appeal to the Supreme Court to allow Palestinians to travel on the highway and Bitounia road, also in the area.
Justices Dorit Beinisch and Uzi Fogelman said that the military does not have the authority to impose a permanent and sweeping limitation on Palestinian travel along the West Bank section of the road because that in effect transforms the road into a route designed for 'internal' Israeli traffic alone.
It also said the closure of the road does not benefit the local population, from whom lands were appropriated to build it. The judges ruled that security considerations cannot take precedence.
"It's a huge victory," said Melanie Takefman, spokeswoman for the Association for Civil Rights in Israel, which represented the Palestinians in their petition before the court.
The restrictions caused hardships for tens of thousands of Palestinians, who were forced to travel on dirt roads to other areas of the West Bank. That problem was eased last year with the opening of alternative paved routes for Palestinians.
Palestinian Hassan Mafarjeh, the mayor of Beit Liqya village near the highway, said the alternate road was not a solution. "We reject the principle that our land is expropriated to build more roads," he said.
He said the trip to the main city in the area, Ramallah, took an hour on the dirt roads and 30 minutes on the alternate road. Using the highway would cut that to just 15 minutes, he said.
Tuesday's ruling marks the second time in months that Israel's Supreme Court has ordered the military to open West Bank roads deemed off-limits to Palestinians.
The court ordered the military to reopen West Bank sections of the road linking Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, and stated that there is no reason for such a sweeping ban on Palestinian travel on the road at this time.
The road was closed to Palestinians in 2002 after Palestinian militants shot at Israeli vehicles traveling on that route, at times killing motorists.
Palestinians living in West Bank villages near the road petitioned to reopen it in 2007.
The court ruled that its order is to go into effect within five months.
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90% of ISraelis know that the unelected egg-heads who run the supreme court are extreme left and hate juadism and the state of ISrael. Its time the supreme court we abolished and one constituted like the one in the UK or the USA which is subserviant to the people and not a dictatorship
And Israel has been so angelic towards pals. Look at statistics and maybe if u werent so blind you would see the root of the problem.
Let us not forget when hizbulah snuck across the border and kidnapped tw soldiers, or when israel was forced to do the gaza offensive in responce to the hams shelling southern israel for eight years.
"Palestine does not exist and is a mythical location" 70 years ago there was no "Israel" and no "Israelis".... Time moves on...
In the decades to come when the Palestinain population surpasses the Israeli population and when the Arab states get more and more powerful and when Israel can no longer rely on US financial support and when Iran eventually gets its nukes and when the Israeli economy will need to trade with its middleeast neighbours to survive and when even the major powers get fed up with Israeli occupation and brutality and will eventually have to withdraw from occupied territory, what will radicals like Chaim and their children say when the free palestinians say... "This is not Israel".
that includes your christian evangelist zionest and some pathetic catholics. 6.5 billion poeple say there is palestine . so for each person that says there is no palestine there is 635 people that say there is . ben kahan i did the math for you
I find it disgusting that Palestinians in the West Bank were banned from using a highway that went through the territory. If Canada built a road near my house and did not allow me to use it I would be furious. The Palestinians in the territories deserve rights or else there will never be peace
its on palestinian land.
Hire a few hundred traffic cops is somebody is nervous about more traffic on the road. Charge it to the Defense budget as an occupation expense. Occupations are not supposed to be free or low cost. Or better yet, make peace and guarantee no more land appropriations or taxation without representation.
long before fake Palestinians aka Arabs appeared on horizon.Contrary to Arabs,Jews were always there and even if you call the land Palestine it doesn't mean that Arabs are the owner.The true owner remain Jewish people as the natives are the owner of the land where you live even if they are minority there.The land still bellongs to them like it or not. So even if you call the land Palestine we know that you talk about Judea and Samaria the land historically attached to the Jews not to Arabs.
I have given up on the idea of Israel as a possible partner for peace with the Palestinians. The only consolation is reading clueless posts such as Chaim's above; that attitude is why "one state, one person, one vote" is probably inevitable, with all its attendant harm to the Zionist ideal. At the end of the day, Israel's greed for more than what it deserves will be the end of it. Chaim illustrates the point perfectly.
It would be one step in the right direction, for the Palestinians, All Roads in and out of the west bank, and east Jerusalem, should be opened too all, and not just for one group of people.
The PALs only know one thing and that it to break and blow up things rather than build them. Why reward them since these are the same PALs that support hamas and islamic jidad?? I dont care if they are civilians. You support a terrorist even if its your father, brother, mother or anyone then you should be treated as a terrorist.
It is only in Israel that the clear safety of people put at risk to please an agenda , to advance a political point . Nobody really could doubt that opening the road would cost lives , as it was proven every time . The army specialists opinions are dismissed and a delusion rules . It is Beyond believe .
If Palestine does not exist then make all the the arabs living in West Bank and Gaza citizens of Israel.
Why are Israelis unhappy when Jimmy Carter talks about apartheid? Just have the courage to admit it!
will be able to ride a bus on Jews only Hway now.....
No country in the world empowers its supreme court to overrule security decisions in wartime, and this is an example of why. Highway 443 was built parallel to the existing road between Arab towns a mile away to prevent terrorist attacks on passing Israeli motorists, by creating separate roads - NOT to create a short-cut to Ramallah for Arabs. They don't need to "benefit" from 443 because it was created only in response to their terrorism. In view of this stupid ruling, the correct response of the Israeli government and IDF should be to simply rip out the short connector road from Ramallah to 443, thus eliminating the value of 443 to local Arabs, who can go back to using their own roads and the 30 minute drive on "alternate" road Israel built for them, or on their original "60 min." pre-67 road. Eliminates terrorism risk, and need for a cumbersome, dangerous security roadblock to check all motorists where west end of 443 crosses the Green Line, where PA Arabs are still banned anyway.
So i do not understand why they need to open up this section of the highway for them? Is not security a good reason to close up at least part of 443?
like it or not Palestine was there when the british was in power like it or not Palestine will be again if you want your jewish existant to continue, because I do not believe 1 state is in the best interest of the jewish people:)
You can call it Oz or whatever you please but its still Israel as Palestine does not exist and is a mythical location. The road is real and it's an Israeli highway in Israel. Just so you know.
I suggest that Haaretz should be more accurate in the description of this road. Calling it an Israeli highway gives the impression that it is situated in Israel within the green line which it is not. It is built in Palestinian land confiscated from its rightful owners without compensation and without allowing them to travel on it. By international law the road is in Palestinian territory and is therefore PALESTINIAN regardless of who built it!