Details
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- 1) "Emergency
Regulation (Requisition of Property) Ordinance" (1948) This
was the initial legislation which gave the Israeli government the
right to take Palestinian lands. The reasoning that could be used
to do this are listed therein. The required state of emergency had
been declared almost immediately in mid-1948, and has been in place
since then up to the present.
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EMERGENCY REGULATION (REQUISITION
OF PROPERTY) ORDINANCE
(passed by the Knesset on the 22nd Cheshvan, 5710 (14th
November, 1949)) |
Basis for
exercise of
power. |
3.
- (a) A competent authority shall not make a land requisition
order or housing order under this Law, save in a time
of emergency.
- (b) A competent authority shall not make a land requisition
order or housing order under this Law unless he is satisfied
that the making of the order is necessary for the defence
of the state, public security, the maintenance of essential
supplies or essential public services, the absorption
of immigrants or the rehabilitation of ex-soldiers or
war invalids.
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- 2) "Abandoned
Areas Ordinance" (1948) In this law in section 2(a), the Knesset
gave the government the power to declare any area abandoned and
to thus expropriate it as state lands. Unfortunately, as required
in section 2(b), many places of Islamic worship were not respected
because no one was around to protest, and thus were either flattened
or turned into libraries, community centers, etc. (for example).
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ABANDONED AREAS ORDINANCE
No. 12 of 5708—1948 |
Powers of
Government. |
2.
- (a) The Government may, by order, declare any area or
place conquered, surrendered or deserted as specified
in section 1 (a) to be an abandoned area, and upon such
declaration being made, such area shall be considered
an abandoned area for the purposes of this Ordinance and
any regulation made thereunder.
- (b). For the purposes of this Ordinance the Government
may, by order, extend the whole or any part of the existing
law to any abandoned area, subject to the safeguarding
of the right of worship and the other religious rights
of the inhabitants in so far as the safeguarding of such
rights does not prejudice public security and order, and
may also empower the Prime Minister or any other Minister
to make such regulations as he may deem expedient as to
matters relating to the defence of the State, public security,
supply and essential services, schools, hospitals and
clinics, health, labour, police or Arab Settlement Police,
courts and the appointment of judges-whether with full
or with limited jurisdiction--prisons, lock-ups and places
of detention, and the expropriation and confiscation of
movable and immovable property, within any abandoned area.
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- 3) "Absentees'
Property Law" (1950) - the law where the Israeli government
confiscated the property of Palestinians (land and everything on
it) who left during the fighting in 1948, and gave it over to a
government agent (Custodian of Absentees' Property) who then did
with it what he wished. In section 1(b), the law defines "absentee".
In section 2 and 4, the government appoints the Custodian and gives
him full government level powers and protections, and full rights
over the property. During the fighting and afterward, over 500 Palestinian
villages were flattened.
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ABSENTEES' PROPERTY LAW
(passed by the Knesset on the 25th Adar, 5710 (14th March
1950)) |
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1. In this Law --
- (b) "absentee" means -
- (1) a person who, at any time during the period
between the 16th Kislev, 5708 (29th November, 1947)
and the day on which a declaration is published, under
section 9(d) of the Law and Administration Ordinance,
5708-1948(1), that the state of emergency declared
by the Provisional Council of State on the 10th Iyar,
5708 (19th May, 1948)(2) has ceased to exist, was
a legal owner of any property situated in the area
of Israel or enjoyed or held it, whether by himself
or through another, and who, at any time during the
said period -
- (i) was a national or citizen of the Lebanon,
Egypt, Syria, SaudiArabia, Trans-Jordan, Iraq
or the Yemen, or
- (ii) was in one of these countries or in any
part of Palestine outside the area of Israel,
or
- (iii) was a Palestinian citizen and left his
ordinary place of residence in Palestine
- (a) for a place outside Palestine before
the 27th Av, 5708 (1st September, 1948); or
- (b) for a place in Palestine held at the
time by forces which sought to prevent the
establishment of the State of Israel or which
fought against it after its establishment;
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Custodian of
Absentees'
Property. |
2.
- (a) The Minister of Finance shall appoint, by order
published in Reshumot, a Custodianship Council
for Absentees' Property, and shall designate one of its
members to be the chairman of the Council. The chairman
of the Council shall be called the Custodian.
- (b) The Custodian may bring an action and institute
any other legal proceeding against any person and be a
plaintiff, defendant or otherwise a party in any legal
proceeding.
- (c) The Custodian is entitled to be represented in any
legal proceeding by the Attorney-General or his representative.
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Vesting of
absentees'
property in
Custodian. |
4.
- (a) Subject to the provisions of this Law -
- (1) all absentees' property is hereby vested in
the Custodian as from the day of publication of his
appointment or the day on which it became absentees'
property, whichever is the later date;
- (2), every right an absentee had in any property
shall pass automatically to the Custodian at the time
of the vesting of the property; and the status of
the Custodian shall be the same as was that of the
owner of the property.
- (b) The proceeds of vested property shall be dealt with
like the vested property yielding the proceeds.
- (c) Vested property -
- (1) shall remain vested property so long as it has
not become released property under section 28 or ceased
to be absentees' property under section 27;
- (2) may be taken over by the Custodian wherever
he may find it.
- (d) Where the Custodian has acquired any property which
was not absentees' property at the time of the acquisition,
in exchange for vested property, the acquired property
shall become held property and shall be dealt with as
was the property in exchange for which it was acquired.
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- 4) "Development
Authority (Transfer of Property) Law" (1950) This law creates
a government land acquisition and development agency which has the
right to take land without limits (section 3(1), but yet it cannot
sell or transfer public lands except to other agencies of the Israeli
government or to the Jewish National Fund (JNF) (as per section
3(4)(a)) (the institute for "landless" Arabs named therein
has never been created). And then any other land has to be offered
first to the JNF (as per section 3(4)(b)).
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DEVELOPMENT AUTHORITY (TRANSFER
OF PROPERTY) LAW
(passed by the Knesset on the 17th Av, 5710 (31st July,
1950)) |
Development
Authority. |
2.
- (a) The Government may, by order published in Reshumot,
appoint a body of persons to be an Authority for the Development
of the Country (in this Law called: "the Development Authority").
- (b) The Development entity shall be a corporate body
and shall be authorized to enter into contracts, possess
and acquire property and to be a party in any legal or
other proceeding.
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| Powers. |
3. The Development Authority is competent
-
- (1) to buy, rent, take on lease, take in exchange or
otherwise acquire property;
- (2) to build, erect, pave, alter, repair, complete,
improve, develop, carry on, maintain, manage, operate
or regulate buildings, ways, roads, railways, bridges,
canals, mines, lines of communication, ports, airfields,
factories, irrigation schemes, afforestation schemes.
electric power plants, transport enterprises, waterworks,
settlement schemes, housing schemes and other undertakings;
- (3) to develop, complete, meliorate, merge, cultivate
and reclaim property;
- (4) to sell or otherwise dispose of, let, grant leases
of, and mortgage property; provided that --
- (a) the Development Authority shall not be authorised
to sell, or otherwise transfer the right of ownership
of, property passing into public ownership, except
to the State, to the Jewish National Fund, to an institution
approved by the Government, for the purposes of this
paragraph, as an institution for the settlement of
landless Arabs, or to a local authority; the right
of ownership of land so acquired may not be re-transferred
except, with the consent of the Development Authority,
to one of the bodies mentioned in this subparagraph;
- (b) the Development Authority shall not be authorised
to sell immovable property not being land passing
into public ownership, unless such property has first
been offered to the Jewish National Fund, and the
Jewish National Fund has not agreed to acquire it
within a period fixed by the Development Authority;
- (c) the total area of immovable property, not being
land passing into public ownership, which the Development
Authority may sell, or the right of ownership of which
it may otherwise transfer, shall not exceed 100,000
dunams, but immovable property acquired by any of
the bodies mentioned in subparagraph (a) shall not
be taken into account for the purposes of this subparagraph;
- (d) the sale, or the transfer of the right of ownership
in any other way, of immovable property, being land
passing into public ownership or other immovable property,
shall be effected by decision of the Government in
each individual case;
- (5) to borrow or lend moneys, to obtain or grant credits,
and to guarantee debts or contracts of other persons;
- (6) to establish, join, or initiate or encourage the
establishment of, companies, cooperative societies, partnerships
and other bodies;
- (7) to act as guardian, curator, trustee, agent or attorney
of any and in respect of any matter;
- (8) to employ agents, officials and other employees
and to prescribe their conditions of service;
- (9) to do anything necessary for the exercise of any
of its powers;
- (10) to exercise any of its powers together or in partnership
with the organs of the State, the Jewish Agency, the Jewish
National Fund, local authorities, companies, cooperative
societies and other bodies or persons.
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- 5) "State
Property Law" (1951) - this law codifies as regular law the
provisions of the "Emergency
Regulation (Requisition of Property) Ordinance" of 1948 so that
the ability of the government to expropriate private land "as
it may think fit" is not dependent on there being a state of
emergency, as per section 4. This law also transfers to the state
all lands controlled or owned by the British Mandate government
(Palestine Authorities) (section 2), as well as any property that
was abandoned in the 1948 fighting, or otherwise appears ownerless
(section 3). But again, it forbids the government from selling this
land in section 5(b) once it has acquired it.
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STATE PROPERTY LAW
(passed by the Knesset on the 30th Shevat, 5711 (6th February,
1951)) |
Property of
the Palestine
authorities
to be State
property. |
2. Property of the Palestine authorities,
situate in Israel, is property of the State of Israel as from
the 6th Iyar, 5708 (15th May, 1948). |
Ownerless
property
to be State
property. |
3. Ownerless property situate in Israel
is property of the State of Israel as from the day of its
becoming ownerless or as from the 6th Iyar, 5708 (15th May,
1948), whichever is the later date. |
Acquisition
etc. of pro-
perty on be-
half of the
State. |
4. The Government may, on behalf of the
State, acquire by way of purchase or exchange or in any other
manner, hire, take on lease or otherwise acquire rights in,
property situate in or out of Israel, on such conditions as
it may think fit. |
Transactions
involving
State pro-
perty. |
5.
- (a) Subject to the provisions of subsections (b) and
(c), the Government, may, on behalf of the State, sell
or otherwise dispose of, let, grant the lease of, exchange,
mortgage, partition, divide, amalgamate, permit the use
or exploitation of or otherwise grant rights in State
property, whether of the kind referred to in section 2
or 3 or other State property, situate in or out of Israel,
on such conditions as it may think fit.
- (b)
- (1) The Government shall not, on behalf of the State,
sell or otherwise transfer the right of ownership
of State property, being immovable property other
than urban property, situate in Israel.
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- 6) "Land
Acquisition (Validation of Acts and Compensation) Law" (1953)
-- this law reaffirms the rights of the government to take over
lands it deems abandoned or ownerless, or which was otherwise acquired
(section 2), awards it to the Development Agency (section 2), but
then sets up procedures to compensate owners if they come forward
in money (section 3). But usually they cannot get their land back,
or get compensation with other land. The end result is that Palestinian
citizens of Israel are now confined to less than 5% of the land
of Israel.
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LAND ACQUISITION (VALIDATION
OF ACTS AND COMPENSATION) LAW
(passed by the Knesset on the 23rd Adar, 5713 (10th March,
1953)) |
Acquisition
of land for
purposes of
development,
settlement,
or security. |
2.
- (a) Property in respect of which the Minister certifies
by certificate under his hand--
- (1) that on the 6th Nisan, 5712 (1st April, 1952)
it was not in the possession of its owners; and
- (2) that within the period between the 5th Iyar,
5708 (14th May, 1948) and the 6th Nisan, 5712 (Ist
April 1952) it was used or assigned for purposes of
essential development, settlement or security; and
.
- (3) that it is still required for any of these purposes--
shall vest in the Development Authority and be regarded
as free from any charge, and the Development Authority
may forthwith take possession thereof.
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Right to
Compensa-
tion. |
3.
- (a) The owners of acquired property are entitled to
compensation therefore from the Development Authority.
The compensation shall be given in money, unless otherwise
agreed between the owners and the Development Authority.
The amount of compensation shall be fixed by agreement
between the Development Authority and the owners or, in
the absence of agreement, by the Court, as hereinafter
provided.
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- 7) "National Parks, Nature Reserves and National Sites Law" (1963))
- gives the government the right to expropriate private lands to
be used as wilderness parks or historic preserves. But this then
became part of public lands which then could not be sold or leased
to non-Jews. In the occupied territories, a similar law was created,
but then some "wilderness areas" were then turned over
to the settlements for development.
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