Israeli Occupation Government Denies Palestinians the Right to Build on their Own Lands, While Allowing Illegal Israeli Settlement Activities to Continue


	Areas A, B, C in the West Bank, according to the Oslo agreement, allowing the Israeli occupation government to administer Area C from 1993 to 1999. Because the Israeli occupation has not ended in 1999, the agreement is obsolete but the repressive Israeli occupation government continues its policies of building new illegal Israeli settlements on the Palestinian lands while denying Palestinians the right to build on their own land.

94% of applications for Palestinian construction permits are rejected by Israel

Friday February 22, 2008 03:15 by Saed Bannoura - IMEMC

The Israeli Peace Now Movement released data on the Israeli policies regarding denying construction permits for Palestinians living in area C, which is under full Israeli Control, and revealed that 94% of construction permit applications filed by the Palestinians are rejected by the so-called Israeli occupation government's Civil Administration Office, which is under the control of the Israeli Army.

The report revealed that while the Israeli occupation government only accepted to grant licenses to nearly 91 Palestinians houses in the period between 2000 and 2004, at least 18,472 houses were built for the - illegal Israeli settlers living in the illegal Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territory of the West Bank.

Under the Oslo agreement, area “C” is “temporarily” under full Israeli control, security and civil control.

The Movement revealed that in the period between 2000 and 2007 94% of construction licensing applications were rejected by the “Civil Administration Office”.

Also, data collected by Peace Now indicated that the Civil Administration is demolishing one-third of the Palestinian houses built without permits while in the Jewish settlements less than 7% of the illegal constructions are demolished.

The data also showed that for every license issued for Palestinian houses in area C, 55 demolishing orders are issued and 18 houses are demolished.

The Israeli Committee Against Home Demolishing published data revealing than since Israel occupied the West Bank and 1967, 18.000 Palestinian homes were demolished while the illegal settlements continuously expanded.

The Committee added that over the last 10 years, no construction permits were granted to Palestinian residents in area C although the lands are owned by the residents which forced most of them to construct their homes without permits. “Those Palestinians that do build without any permission face a rate of demolition (on structures that demolition orders have been issued) of 33%, as opposed to the percentage of demolition orders that are carried out against Israeli settlements, which stands at 7% (The data regarding the demolitions in the settlements is based on Peace Now's report from December 2007)”, Peace Now reported.

Peace Now reported that as Israel only granted construction licenses to 91 Palestinians houses From 2000 until September 2007, settlers built 18.472 houses. In the same period Israel issued 4993 demolishing orders against Palestinian houses and demolished 1663 of them. Israel issued 2900 demolishing orders for settlers homes and only demolished 199.

Full Report published by Peace Now, click the link below

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