To: Prime Minister Ehud Barak

To: Public Security Minister Shlomo Ben Ami 

To: Attorney General Elyakim Rubenstein

Subject: Recommendations of the GSS and the police for limiting the activities of the Islamic movement in Israel

According to recent newspaper reports, the government is considering an array of recommendations aimed at limiting the power of the Islamic Movement in Israel. To this point, the 5 measures that have received the most media coverage are:

1) Withholding or reducing the budget allocations of those villages and towns which are run by Islamic Movement adherents; 

2) Giving priority in funding to those Arab municipalities which have not elected Islamic Movement members; 

3) Allowing the government to assume a greater role in the selection of local Imams; 

4) Denying salary increases to Islamic clerics who take part in religious service courses; 

5) Banning the distribution of newspapers which carry "inflammatory" statements.

In our opinion, these recommendations are completely unacceptable. Even their partial implementation would violate and erode the basic civil rights of many of the Arab citizens of Israel, and enable the government and its ministries to have undue influence and power over citizens' lives. The recommendations of the GSS and the police represent draconian measures more suited to authoritarian regimes, and effectively impart collective punishment on the residents of those towns where Islamic Movement candidates have been democratically elected. In their disregard for the rule of law and the basic principle of equality, these recommendations are reminiscent of the military administration of the 1950s and 1960s. Moreover, in allowing the government to function above the law, the recommendations effectively remove the role and power of the judiciary, allowing security forces to act as "judges." In the process, the basic freedoms of the people, such as the freedom of the press, the freedom of association, and, above all, the principle of equality, are gravely threatened. 

The Islamic Movement is a political and religious movement which has functioned for years within Arab society in a legal way. The actions of particular individuals cannot legitimize the persecution of a legal association.

Based on these considerations, we ask you to reject even a partial implementation of these recommendations when they are given to you for approval. 

SINCERELY,

Jamil Dakwar

ADVOCATE, Adalah: The Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel