Tel Aviv, Israel- The Coordination of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT), the Israeli Defense Ministry’s department for Palestinian civil affairs, has removed a law which would have required foreign passport holders to enter a formal relationship with a Palestinian living in the West Bank to notify Israeli authorities within 30 days of their engagement, wedding, or moving-in together.
COGAT’s law on Palestinian relationships was supposed to take effect on Monday after the law was gazetted earlier on in February.
Prior to Sunday’s announcement by COGAT, the law was challenged in the Israeli Supreme Court by human rights groups and individuals.
In a statement, HaMoked, an Israeli-Palestinian legal aid organization that was among one of the organizations that challenged the ruling in Israel’s Supreme Court, condemned Israel’s micromanaging of the Palestinian society
“(The) Israeli military takes the prerogative of micromanaging Palestinian society including interfering with the academic freedom of Palestinian universities. This procedure violates Israel’s international legal obligations and HaMoked will continue its legal challenge of it,” said HaMoked Executive Director Jessica Montell.
COGAT also waived quotas on visiting lecturers and students at Palestinian universities, which had been set in the original draft at 100 teachers and 150 students. These quota proposals were condemned by the European Union, whose Erasmus+ exchange program would have been seriously impacted.
The new regulations, which are not applicable to foreigners visiting Israel or Israeli settlements, are supposed to take effect on October 20 for a two-year pilot period
Meanwhile, the Israeli military said on Monday that there was a high possibility that American-Palestinian Al Jazeera reporter, Shireen Abu Akleh, was killed by an Israeli soldier.
Abu Akleh was shot in the head on May 11 while covering an Israeli military operation at a refugee camp in the city of Jenin in the occupied West Bank
The Palestinians blamed Israel for the killing, but Israel initially said the journalist might have been killed by militant fire, and later that it was impossible to determine who had fired the deadly shot. Palestinian accounts and those from other journalists on the scene argued from the start that it was clear which side had shot Abu Akleh.
“There is a high possibility that Ms. Abu Akleh was accidentally hit by IDF gunfire that was fired toward suspects identified as armed Palestinian gunmen,” said the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) in a statement.
However, IDF’s Military Advocate General’s Office said it does not intend to pursue criminal charges or prosecutions of any of the soldiers involved.
“After a comprehensive examination of the incident, and based on all the findings presented, the Military Advocate General determined that under the circumstances of the incident, despite the dire result of the death of Ms. Abu Akleh and Mr. Samudi’s injury there was no suspicion of a criminal offence that warrants the opening of an MPCID investigation.
The decision was based on the findings of the review, which determined that IDF soldiers only aimed fire at those who were identified as armed terrorists during the incident. As such, there was no suspicion that a bullet was fired deliberately at anyone identified as a civilian and in particular at anyone identified as a journalist,” read a statement from the IDF’s Military Advocate General’s Office.
