News in Brief
On 19 November 2009, Adalah submitted a pre-petition to the Attorney General’s (AG) Office on behalf of residents of Tel Arad and Physicians for Human Rights-Israel demanding that the Ministry of Health (MOH) establish a health clinic in the unrecognized Arab Bedouin village as soon as possible. There is currently no clinic in the village to provide medical services for its 2,000 residents, citizens of Israel. Adalah sent several letters to the MOH concerning the issue but no positive result was obtained. The absence of a clinic in the village constitutes a serious danger to the health of the villagers. The letter was sent by Adalah Attorney Sawsan Zaher.
On 19 November 2009, Adalah and the Association for Civil Rights in Israel (ACRI) sent a letter to the Mayor of Nazeret Illit and to the Attorney General (AG) demanding the implementation of a Supreme Court ruling delivered in 2002. The ruling ordered mixed city municipalities, including Nazeret Illit, to add Arabic names to informational and traffic signs erected in the area under its jurisdiction. Most of the signs, new or old, still bear text only in Hebrew and English, including street names and signs indicating public institutions and main roads. The letter was sent by Adalah Attorney Haneen Naamnih and ACRI Attorney Awni Banna.
(See: H.C. 4112/99, Adalah, et. al. v. The Municipalities of Tel Aviv-Jaffa, et. al. (decision delivered 25 July 2002) English summary available at:
http://www.adalah.org/features/landlangrep/4112decision-eng.pdf)
On 16 November 2009, Adalah sent a letter to the General Director of the Israeli Post Office and to the AG requesting that money deposits for Palestinian prisoners incarcerated in Israeli prisons be permitted through their lawyers. These transactions regularly took place until they were recently banned. Adalah submitted the letter on behalf of Adv. Shirrin Isawi, who was recently informed of an order to prohibit the transfer of money to prisoners except in the presence of the depositor in person before the Post Office clerk. However, most families of Palestinian prisoners are prohibited from entering Israel, and thus, this condition constitutes a sweeping ban on the transfer of money to prisoners. The letter was sent by Adalah Attorney Abeer Baker.
On 3 November 2009, Adalah sent a letter to the National Insurance Institute (NII) and to the Minister of Social Welfare demanding that they take action to make the NII building in Shama'amr accessible to people with disabilities as required by law. The Shafa’amr branch of the NII provides services to 3,000 disabled people however, the building is currently inaccessible to many of them hampering the availability of basic services. Adalah demanded that an alternative building be identified for the Shafa’amr branch of the NII with full access for people with disabilities. The letter was sent by Adalah Attorney Sawsan Zaher.
On 28 October 2009, Adalah wrote a letter to the AG and the Ministry of the Interior (MOI) demanding the cancellation of an MOI directive to refuse requests by Arab Bedouin citizens of Israel to change their address to one of an unrecognized village in the Naqab (Negev). This directive is illegal and causes serious harm to residents who have relocated to an unrecognized village and wish to register their correct address as required by law. As Adalah argued, the undeclared goal of the directive is to deter people from moving to the unrecognized villages, and to increase pressure on Arab Bedouin inhabitants of these villages to move to government-planned towns. The letter was sent by Adalah Attorney Sawsan Zaher.
