By Rabbi Arik Ascherman, Executive Director of Rabbis for Human Rights*

I am sitting cross-legged in a Jahalin Bedouin tent, sipping tea and speaking with Mukhtar Abu-Daud about Israeli government efforts to limit his clan to a designated "reservation." The problems of the Jahalin can be traced back to founding of West Bank settlement Maaleh Adumim in 1975 or to when they were intimidated into leaving Israel in the early 50's.

However, Abu-Daud points out another unexpected milestone. He notes that the relations with the Israeli government became markedly worse following the signing of the Oslo accords in 1993.

The outbreak of the current intifada in 2000 caught many by surprise. However, it was not a surprise to those of us, who had been hearing increasingly over the two years previous to the current intifada¾ at road blocks, amidst the rubble of demolished homes, from families whose land was being expropriated or who had but two hours of running water a week during the summer and fall - "This is not peace."

We heard the same thing from Israelis as they buried the victims of terror attacks.

Abuse of Human Rights

Everybody speaks about human rights. Few terms are more bandied about and few terms are more abused. As Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel wrote, "To the man (sic) of our age, nothing is as familiar and nothing as trite as words."

Clearly, all too often human rights are a club with which to score propaganda points against our adversaries, but a matter of expediency at home. Palestinians are all too happy to accuse Israel of every human rights violation imaginable, but Palestinian activists who advocate human rights are frequently jailed by the Palestinian Authority. When Rabbis for Human Rights brought up the PA’s human rights violations against its own people in a 1995 meeting with Chairman Arafat, he didn't want to hear about it.

In Israel, anybody advocating Palestinian human rights is discounted as a "leftist." Moreover, Yitzhak Rabin frequently stated that the new Palestinian Authority would be able to deal with terror without the oversight of a supreme court or human rights watchdog agencies. Even some of those substantially to Rabin's left, during the heady days of Oslo under the Peres-Rabin government, believed that human rights could temporarily be sacrificed in order to achieve the peace which was "just around the corner."

Certainly, we are far from a world that truly assimilates in its actions the basic Jewish teaching, that all human beings are created B'Tselem Elohim, in God's image.

Moral Obligation

Human rights matter. They are firstly a moral obligation, embodying the Torah's message that all human beings are created in God's Image. This includes both Israelis and Palestinians. In the words of the interfaith declaration initiated by Rabbis for Human Rights, which is currently being signed by Israeli and Palestinian Moslem, Christian, Druze and Jewish clergy, "The suffering of Israelis and Palestinians must stop. An attack against any human being is an attack against God."

Practically, human rights violations were a major factor in the breakdown of the Oslo process. Neither the Jews nor the Palestinians lived up to their Oslo commitments. Just as Palestinian terror attacks fostered disillusionment among many Israelis about the Oslo peace process, Israeli human rights violations stirred massive Palestinian disillusionment.

From the outset of the Oslo process, Israel frequently violated human rights in order to prevent Palestinians from expanding their presence in Area C - those portions of the Territories still under total Israeli control and subject to negotiation. Successive Israeli governments continued to expropriate land, uproot trees, pave roads, enforce unfair water allocation, etc. Bedouin Arabs, such as the Jahalin, were forcibly relocated from these lands onto reservations.

Palestinians found it nearly impossible to receive legal building permits in Area C or Jerusalem without paying a bribe. Later, Israeli forces demolished many of these "illegal" homes. Even simple Palestinian cave dwellers were expelled their homes in the South Hebron Hills, so as not to complicate the possible future annexation of a zone "free" of Palestinians - an area that extended from the 1967 border to the Jewish settlement of Kiryat Arba near Hebron.

The decision about whether or not to attempt to claim land in Area C is a political question. However, whether one agrees or disagrees with the goal, it is wrong to allow the ends to justify the means. We can debate whether Israel’s borders should be redrawn to keep Kiryat Arba as part of Israel. But expelling 700 men, women and children into the cold of approaching winter is a human rights violation.

Human Rights Advocacy

Rabbis for Human Rights and other Israeli human rights organizations intervened in many cases. In the years just prior to the second intifada, we helped the Bedouins achieve a precedent setting compromise to reduce Arab home demolitions, and to bring about the Israeli High Court order returning the cave dwellers to their homes. But the damage had been done. These violations provoked bitter resentment among the Palestinians - resentment and disillusionment that fueled the second intifada in September 2000.

At the time, the cause of the uprising was disputed among Israel's two major intelligence agencies. The Army Intelligence Unit declared that it had been planned and ordered by Yasser Arafat after he didn’t get what he wanted at Camp David. The General Security Services determined that it was a spontaneous, popular revolt. Indeed, those of us working on the ground had warned of a second intifada a year and a half before it erupted because, as indicated above, we heard more and more average Palestinians saying, "This is not a peace process."

After more than two years of the intifada, debating its origins may seem academic. Murder is the ultimate human rights violation, and Israel must clearly defend herself. However, even as we defend ourselves and unequivocally condemn Palestinian violence, we Israelis must admit some responsibility for our actions that helped fuel this cycle of violence. Refusal to do so only leads to acquiescence in the face of ongoing human rights violations, provoking further resentment and calls for revenge among Palestinians.

Many Israelis are under informed about the realities in the Occupied Territories today, and will therefore be susceptible to claims that seek to justify human rights violations on the basis of security. However, most Israelis do believe that documented human rights violations during this intifada are wrong.

These violations include shooting and hampering the movement of ambulances; limiting access to medical care beyond what is required to do security checks; killing civilians in violation of the army's own open fire regulations; uprooting trees and other damage to Palestinian property beyond what can be justified by security; pillaging Palestinian homes; collective punishment; and economic warfare against Palestinians.

Many Israelis agree with the Talmudic Tractate Sanhedrin's differentiation between legitimate defense and acts forbidden even in times of war. Nevertheless, Israelis often fall back on the justification that "The Palestinians started it." Taking responsibility for the role of human rights violations in creating the intifada is therefore essential to the prevention of future violations and to the success of future peace negotiations.

Some day we will again sit down to negotiate. If we are to do a better job the next time, Israelis must learn that, however generous Israel’s offers, one cannot negotiate peace with one hand and violate human rights with the other. For their part, Palestinians must learn that violence is wrong, begets only more violence, and poisons the atmosphere necessary to create a better future for all of us.

* This essay has been edited slightly by Robert Traer. It is available online in its original form at http://rhr.israel.net/pencraft/humanrightsmatter.shtml.

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