Prevention of Infiltration Law - The Prevention of Infiltration Law

The Prevention of Infiltration Law

The Prevention of Infiltration (Offences and Jurisdiction) Law, 5714-1954 defined as an "infiltrator" anyone who (Article 1 (a)):

...has entered Israel knowingly and unlawfully and who at any time between the 16th Kislev, 3708 (29th November 1947) and his entry was -

(1) a national or citizen of the Lebanon, Egypt, Syria, Saudi-Arabia, Trans-Jordan, Iraq or the Yemen ; or

(2) a resident or visitor in one of those countries or in any part of Palestine outside Israel ; or

(3) a Palestinian citizen or a Palestinian resident without nationality or citizenship or whose nationality or citizenship was doubtful and who, during the said period, left his ordinary place of residence in an area which has become a part of Israel for a place outside Israel.

According to COHRE and BADIL (p. 38), under the Prevention of Infiltration (Offences and Jurisdiction) Law, 5714-1954, the definition of ‘infiltrators’ corresponded closely with that of ‘absentees’. The law established strict penalties for such ‘infiltration’. Under this law, ‘internal refugees’ (Palestinians who were declared absent from their own villages but inside Palestine at the time Israel was created) were also barred from returning to their villages. When caught, these were then expelled from Israel. Over the ensuing years, several thousand internally displaced Palestinians were expelled in this manner, paving the way for Jewish immigration and colonisation of their lands.

According to Kirsbaum over the years, the Israeli Government has continued to cancel and modify some of the Defense (Emergency) Regulations of 1945, but mostly it has added more as it has continued to extend its declared state of emergency. For example, even though the Prevention of Infiltration Law of 1954 is not labelled as an official "Emergency Regulation", it extends the applicability of the Defence (Emergency) Regulation 112 of 1945 giving the Minister of Defence extraordinary powers of deportation for accused infiltrators even before they are convicted (Articles 30 & 32), and makes itself subject to cancellation when the Knesset ends the State of Emergency upon which all of the Emergency Regulations are dependent.

According to a Tel-Aviv University document the Law does not consider the motives of the person for crossing the border and entering Israel. It also enables the establishment of Tribunals for the Prevention of Infiltration, in which judges will preside who are military officers (but who do not necessarily possess legal knowledge) and enables the tribunal to deviate from the rules of evidence. The penalties for infiltration are severe - and may reach imprisonment for five years. The author states that in practice, no uniform practice is employed in relation to persons who cross the border and apply for asylum. Some have been held for periods of two or three years in prison, others have been released from prison on various conditions, while others have not been allowed to enter Israel at all and were returned to the place from which they came (in possible breach of the principle of non-refoulement).

A new government bill, updating the Infiltration Prevention Law, was passed in a vote after the first reading in the last Israeli Knesset term in May 2008, and is being debated in the Committee of Interior in preparation for the second vote and, if this passes, the final vote in the plenum. The bill would allow officers of the Israel Defense Forces to deport asylum seekers, many from Darfur, South Sudan, and Eritrea, back to Egypt. This could be done without providing for a Refugee Status Determination process, as required under in the 1951 Geneva Convention for the protection of Refugees. In the discussions in the Knesset committee, a UNHCR representative emphasized that the international community may criticize Israel if the law did not follow international law. This bill was dropped in July 2010.

A new amendment was brought into the Knesset, which was passed in first reading on 28 March 2011. The law was passed on 9 January 2012 and became law on June 3, 2012.