Full text of Knesset Law passed 22 February 2010

Bataween
Point of No Return
26 February '10

The rights to compensation of Jewish refugees from Arab countries and Iran, 22 February 2010

1.Purpose

The purpose of this Law is to protect the rights to compensation of Jewish refugees from Arab countries and Iran in the framework of peace negotiations in the Middle East.

2.Definitions:

In this Law --


"Refugee Jews from Arab countries and Iran" - who are any of the following:

(1) He is a citizen of Israel*, or lived there before the establishment of the state;

(2) He was a resident of Arab countries or Iran, and left mostly because he was persecuted on account of his Jewishness and his inability to defend himself against such persecution.

(3) He left property** he owned in his country of origin

**"Property" - land, assets, cash, rights, and other property seized by government order.

3. Negotiations to achieve peace

In negotiations to achieve peace in the Middle East, the government must include the issue of providing compensation for loss of property to Jewish refugees from Arab countries and Iran, including property owned by Jewish communities in these countries.

4.Execution

The Prime Minister is to be in charge of the implementation of this Law.

Signed by

Benjamin Netanyahu
Prime Minister

Shimon Peres
President

Reuven Rivlin
Speaker of the Knesset

* Although the Law applies only to Israeli citizens, a mechanism is being sought to cover Jewish refugees living outside Israel, similar to that for Holocaust survivors
resident outside Israel.

Related: Israel's answer to the Palestinian 'right of return'

Israel's answer to the Palestinian 'right of return'

Bataween
Point of No Return
23 February '10

On Monday evening, Israel’s parliament, the Knesset, quietly passed a bill that could change the Middle East agenda forever.

Up to a million Jews were forced to leave Arab countries and Iran in the decades following the foundation of the State of Israel in 1948, due to state-sanctioned persecution and violence. Today only some 4,000 Jews are left in the Arab world, bringing to an end a Jewish presence that in many cases pre-dated Islam and the Arab conquest by 1,000 years.



The bill has taken two years, since its initiation by MK Nissim Ze’ev of the Sephardi Orthodox Shas party, to become law. The new law aims to protect the rights of Jewish refugees from Arab countries and Iran in future peace negotiations in the Middle East. The bill defines a Jewish refugee as an Israeli citizen who left one of the Arab states, or Iran, following religious persecution. It stipulates that the Israeli government must include Jewish refugee rights, notably compensation, in all future peace talks.

Stanley Urman, the head of the advocacy group Justice for Jews from Arab Countries, welcomed the Knesset decision, saying: “The world must realise that Palestinians were not the only Middle East refugees; that there were Jewish refugees who also have rights under international law. This recognition is good for the State of Israel and it is good for the people of Israel."

Why is this bill so important? Because it holds the key to real peace in the Middle East. So many efforts at making peace between Israel and the Palestinians have run aground on the rock of the Palestinian ‘right of return’. Not content with a Palestinian Arab state in the West Bank and Gaza, even the ‘moderates’ of the Fatah camp have been reluctant to recognise Israel as a Jewish state. The reason is that they are unwilling to drop their demand for the Arab refugees of 1948 – who now number upwards of four million if you include their descendants - to return to their homes in what is now Israel. This demand amounts to no less than the destruction of Israel by demographic means and the de facto creation of two Palestinian states, one in the West Bank, and one in place of Israel.

(Read full article)
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Jewish refugees must be tied to Palestinian issue

Bataween
Point of No Return
18 February '10

The fullest account yet of Monday's important Knesset reception to mark the passing of Israel's prospective law tying compensation for Jewish refugees expelled from Arab countries to a future peace deal comes from Rachel Kliger of The Media Line. There would be no discussion of Palestinian refugees unless the Jewish refugees problem was resolved.In heated exchanges with refugees in the audience deputy foreign minister Danny Ayalon revealed that his father left his belongings behind in Algeria to come to Israel in 1948.

The Palestinian spokesman interviewed at the end admits that the Arabs have enough money to solve the plight of Palestinian refugees, but 'the problem belongs to Israel'. If Israel gave them their 'rights' - consenting to being overrun by the Arab 'right of return', perhaps? - the Arabs might compensate Israel, he concedes. (With thanks bh)

Israeli lawmakers are seeking a law that will make compensation for Jewish refugees expelled from Arab countries after 1948 an integral part of any future peace negotiations. Lawmakers put together a bill demanding compensation for current Jewish Israeli citizens, who were expelled from Arab countries after Israel was established in 1948, leaving behind significant valuable property.

Originally submitted almost a year ago in the Knesset, Israel’s parliament, the bill passed its first hearing two weeks ago. Now various interest groups are pushing the bill with the Knesset’s 120 members before it is subjected to a second and third hearing next week.

(Read full article)
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