Regavim, the right-wing equivalent of Peace Now, says Europe is using an impoverished Bedouin population to create political facts on the ground
Illegally constructed structures in the hamlet of Arareh, east of Jerusalem, April 29, 2015 (photo credit: Elhanan Miller/Times of Israel)
Two biblical verses look down from the conference room wall of Regavim, an Israeli NGO that monitors and reports on illegal Arab construction in Israel and the West Bank. The first, taken from the book of Genesis, sums up the organization’s motivation, iterated in the words of God to Abraham: “All the land that you see I will give to you and your offspring, forever.”
The second, epitomizing Regavim’s modus operandi, quotes from the first chapter of Isaiah: “Zion will be delivered with justice.” Regavim – Israel Independence Fund was founded in 2006 by newly elected Jewish Home MK Bezalel Smotrich and Yehuda Eliyahu in response to a September 2005 Supreme Court case brought by Peace Now against the illegal outpost of Harasha in Samaria.
Today, with a staff of 10 working from offices at the Sha’ar Binyamin Industrial Zone southeast of Ramallah, Regavim defines its mission as “setting a Zionist agenda for the State of Israel, with an emphasis on the land and its management and preservation.” In practical terms, that means deploying dozens of volunteers to the field and using sophisticated aerial footage to track Arab building violations.
Most recently, the group has chosen to focus on the European Union and its massive funding of illegal Bedouin construction in areas east of Jerusalem, commonly known as E-1. According to a report published in January titled “Illegal EU building in Adumim Region,” over the past two years the European Union has helped erect hundreds of illegal structures in area C of the West Bank, administratively controlled by Israel, in violation of Israeli building laws.
“One could never imagine that Germany would fund the building of thousands of illegal dwelling places in the suburbs of Paris as a ‘permanent solution’ for the Roma living in France, in complete opposition to the policy and laws of France,” claimed the report’s introduction.
Beyond its genuine concern for the well-being of the poorest Palestinians, the EU is politically motivated to entrench the Jahallin Bedouin on the strategic tracts of land they currently settle in order to maintain Arab contiguity between the northern and southern West Bank, Regavim argued. But the organization takes issue not only with Europe, but also with Israel’s bureaucracy and legal system which allows the situation to continue unabated.
“Europe has decided to go it alone, and Israel has decided to allow it,” said Ari Biggs, Regavim’s director of international relations. The EU did not submit a response to Regavim’s allegations by time of publication.
Water pipes from France, solar panels from the EU
In the Bedouin hamlet of Jahallin-‘Ar’arah, just off Highway 1 leading from Jerusalem down to the Dead Sea, raw sewage streamed between makeshift tin shacks and animal pens. On Tuesday, many outhouses and other structures in the village displayed prominent EU stickers.
The Jahallin migrated from the area of Arad in the northern Negev after being driven out by Israel in the early 1950s. Deifallah, 65, a shepherd and community leader, said that while Israeli restrictions on new construction continue to be imposed, a new water pipeline donated by French NGO Action Against Hunger (ACF) two years ago has ended the need to travel long distances to filling stations. Water is provided for free by the Palestinian Authority, which then compensates Israeli water company Mekorot.
Six months ago, Palestinian organization Arij provided solar panels to the entire community, fulfilling its energy needs. Deifallah said the panels were donated by the EU.
“The purpose is to make life easier for the students studying at night,” he told The Times of Israel. “Every two or three homes received a panel.” The only regular interface between the Bedouin tribe and the Palestinian Authority, Deifallah added, is the school bus that arrives daily to pick up students studying in Jerusalem.
A cynical foundation gone serious
In its daily routine, Regavim mirrors Israeli left-wing NGOs such as Peace Now, Ir Amim and Bimkom, who for years have been documenting illegal Jewish construction in the West Bank and bringing their findings to Israel’s High Court for redress. That’s a comparison which Meir Deutsch, Regavim’s director of policy and government relations, feels uncomfortable with.
“We react to reality, not to other organizations and people,” he said, though he acknowledged that Regavim has adopted the left’s modes of operation. “The left would go to court and paint a picture as though all the illegal construction in Israel is done by Jews in illegal outposts in Judea and Samaria. Regavim was created to display the entire picture, and say ‘let’s talk about illegal construction.’ Let’s talk about 70,000 illegal structures in the south, let’s talk about 40,000 illegal structures in the north. According to Peace Now’s statistics, there are approximately 3,000 illegal structures in the [Jewish] outposts. So let’s keep things in perspective.”
Deutsch said Regavim emerged with the understanding that Israeli courts are increasingly defining policy on cardinal issues to Israel’s existence rather than interpreting it.
“It doesn’t matter what you put in the ballot box, reality is determined in court,” he said. “The Supreme Court has stopped being only the judiciary and has become the executive as well.” Although Regavim was created to highlight the courts’ left-wing bias on land issues, it soon began taking its own alarming findings much more seriously.
“At first, we went south as a means to help Jewish settlement in Judea and Samaria, to say ‘look what’s they’re doing over there,’” Deutsch added. But we quickly realized that there’s a serious problem that needs solving. There are strategic issues at hand, irrespective of the [Jewish] outposts. We’ve changed our mindset; now we believe that anything illegal should be dealt with.”
That treatment is being undertaken by Regavim with increasingly sophisticated means. The organization has access to the Civil Administration’s database, regularly tracking illegal construction using detailed maps provided by the government on CDs. A small drone owned by the organization and equipped with a Go-Pro camera flies over Arab communities across the country on a daily basis, documenting any change on the ground. In addition, Regavim periodically purchases high-resolution aerial footage from a commercial Israeli company. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YIel8nK9SyE
“We aren’t here to replace the state, but rather to bring it to the places it refuses to go to,” said Ovad Arad, Regavim’s director of Field Operations. “We want to put a mirror in front of it and say ‘this is the situation.’”
dove Said:
I don’t discuss Strategy in public forums
@ mrg3105:
Explain please.
Actually repatriating/resettleing the Arabs was the UN strategy in 1946…or was supposed to be
The trouble was that the UN decided the illegal partition of British Palestine is going to be done three-way, and it didn’t work
I think the reset of that strategy is a good idea
@ bernard ross:
Good poinT! He always does that. Implying that we are no different or better. I beg to differ. We take the high road. Too high sometimes. Too accommodating.
@ Felix Quigley:
Leave me out. I do not hate C.A. at all. I respect his erudition and his cool. I just take exception to some of the charges he lays. Ross thinks he is an antisemite. I don’t.
CuriousAmerican Said:
CA’s never ending quest to equate the Nobel prize winners with the honor killers
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bcrEqIpi6sg
Felix Quigley Said:
😛 😛 😛
Felix Quigley Said:
from one sentence to the next Quigley loses his memory.
Even funnier is that quigley agreed with me, as follows:
Felix Quigley Said:
😛 😛 😛 I too saw it as a limited tactic with many limitations
Gosh, one sentence you laud CA for his proposal and the next you disagree and declare it dangerous. 😛 😛 😛
Felix Quigley Said:
I think you can finally quit your day job and go into comedy full time
Now I know why Ted and Ross hate you so much. You have this nasty habit of teling them the truth
So well put there!
The truth is that there is no way forward from Zionism which in many ways is bankrupt.
Mr Ross what precisely do YOU propose. Livni and Herzog in power?
This is so irritating to Ted and Ross. They cannot accept that Zionism does not know what to do.
CA…I disagree with your pay to leave in the way proposed. it is ONE tactic and is NOT a strategy.
You put it forward as a strategy. Very dangerous.
ALL SIDES ARE BANKRUPT. THEY HAVE NO WAY FORWARD.
AT MOST THERE IS A DEFENCE GOING ON AGAINST IRAN WHICH IS DEFENCE AGAINST EXTINCTION. BIBI REPRESENTS THAT AND THAT IS MORE THAN TED AND ROSS.
To be honest:
Sharon called the Jewish construction: “irreversible facts on the ground”
Let’s face it, both sides are in the business of creating “facts on the ground.”
Both sides charge the other with illegal construction. Israel says Bedouin construction is illegal. The Arabs say Jewish construction is in contravention of International Law. Edmund Levy said the construction was in agreement with International Law. The Hague said the Wall was illegal. The Women in Green assert Sovereignty, while the Arabs and their sympathizers assert that Israel is not negotiating in good faith, and never intended to withdraw from Area C at all, nor intended to give the Palestinians a state. It was all a sham. Ted says Jewish construction is allowed by Oslo, while the Arabs say that Oslo forbids unilateral changes to the status quo, which interpret to mean new construction as it would change the possiblity of what reverts back to Arab control. Ted disagrees. Et al. Et al.
Yadda Yadda. As Sonny and Cher said, “the beat goes on.”
Time to forget about legal niceties. If the Arabs are paid/reimbursed to leave, then the Jews can build to their hearts delight, and this repetitively redundant conversation about who is legal, and who is not, can be replaced with Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria.
Undoubtedly the new structures are of good quality, built to EU standards, and when the occupants are evicted, can be used for other purposes since the residents are not structure owners.
The Europeans drove the Jews out of their countries, now they seek to drive the Jews from their own homeland.
Israel in one swift move needs to tear down all illegal building in E1.
Second step with the same bulldozers start building the expansion plans of Maaleh Adumuim into E1.
BB keeps Yaalon in place because he will turn a blind eye to the euros in accordance with BB’s wishes. perhaps Livni in Justice last term was another tactic to maintain this clandestine policy. BB appears to not worry about any ministry or issue other than those he keeps close to his control. Keeping YS JEW FREE, obstructing Jewish settlement, except in the major existent blocks, I have come to believe is part of an unfolding long term under the table deal which also involves the gulf arab nations. Both sides moving their constituencies quietly towards a goal while putting out the opposite rhetoric as a fig leaf: a drama to engage fools. Many of BB’s major decisions over the last few years support this thesis.
The latest being the Hamas facilitation. Forget rhetoric of both sides and the actions show the real story. its like a fixed fight where there is lots of drama, and everyone takes it seriously, and only the fixers know the real story. Each war in Gaza makes the insane Gaza population more amenable to truce and then peace. The constituencies on both sides need to accommodate over time to new facts. This means bringing the consensus on both sides to the middle. Hence, BB election is really a loss to the right rather than a win, as he is able to defuse and dilute the only power seeking YS. Same with BB and Abbas, pretending to fight for the audience. E.G. the same tax fight is staged regularly.
what is not confronted is that the person with the greatest amount of power, who has occupied the highest office in Israel for one of the longest stretches, has done absolutely nothing to prevent this from occurring. I have not even heard any excuses from him and his supporters. When it was first publicized BB made a small flourish to make it appear they were tackling the issue and the effect was NOTHING!.
Is BB saying he is unaware of this despicable and disgusting effort by the perennial Jew killers who have now followed the Jews to the Holy land to continue their filthy Jew stalking in the Jewish homeland.
Israelis and Jews need to face the truth, this turning of a blind eye by BB is unlikely to be coincidental or an accident over the years.
If the PM does nothing but fake token actions, over so many years while at the same time tearing down jewish outposts, then it should be logically assumed that he is in collusion and collaboration with the despicable EU effort.
Shame, shame on BB with his fake token flourishes allowing the descendants of the euronazis to swindle the Jews in their own homeland!