Issue No. 13, June 2008 | Donate  | Subscribe 
In Brief
Challenging Religious Discrimination

ACRI successfully represented an Arab woman wearing a headscarf who was forbidden from dining in a Haifa restaurant because the owners claimed she was frightening the other patrons. The incident, which was brought to ACRI's attention through our public hotline, took place during the Second Lebanon War. In June 2008, the Haifa Magistrates Court ruled that the restaurant owners must pay the complainant NIS 2,000 and publish an apology in Israel's largest daily newspaper, Yediot Aharonot.
 
Training for Middle School Civics Teachers

ACRI launched a new program for Arab and Jewish middle school civics teachers, highlighting the importance of human rights and civic engagement in democratic societies. We focused on civics teachers because they play a crucial role in promoting values of democracy and tolerance among their students. ACRI specifically targeted schools in Israel's periphery, in towns such as Akko and Kiryat Gat where students – and entire communities – often suffer from acute discrimination based on nationality, ethnicity, and socio-economic class.
 
Banning the Use of Cluster Bombs

ACRI and B'Tselem called on the Prime Minister to involve Israel in the effort to draft an international agreement on prohibiting the production, possession, and use of cluster bombs. The request was made in advance of the diplomatic conference in Ireland on 19 May, wherein more than 100 states signed a convention that would ban the use of cluster bombs. For more information, see our recent press release here.
 
Safeguarding Human Rights Activities in Hebron

In June, ACRI submitted an intervention to the Commander of the Israel Police, in protest of the Police's failure to protect groups of human rights activists visiting the old city of Hebron from settlers' threats and condemning the slanderous rhetoric expressed by certain members of the force against human rights activism there. The letter highlighted the importance of the activist tours as a tool to reveal the grave human rights violations imposed on Palestinian residents of the city, as a result of the settlers' aggressive and often violent behavior and the IDF's severe restrictions on their freedom of movement. ACRI urged the police not to reward violence and to protect visitors according to the law.
 
An End to Discriminatory Job Postings

In April, the State Employment Service pledged to stop publishing discriminatory job postings, especially those affecting older individuals, following ACRI's petition to the Supreme Court against the unlawful practice.
 
Major "Loss Tender" Cancelled

Also in April, the Tel Aviv Administrative Court ordered the Bat Yam Municipality to cancel an employment contract (known as a "loss tender") for cleaning services worth NIS 18 million because it would have prevented the manpower agency hired by the municipality from paying the cleaning staff minimum wage. ACRI, along with Kav LaOved (Workers' Hotline), submitted expert testimony to the court, claiming that the body that orders the service must be held responsible for paying workers employed by the manpower agency (subcontracted workers) lawful wages and benefits.
 
Demanding Access to Segregated Beaches

In June, ACRI submitted a petition to the Supreme Court against the prohibition on Palestinians entering the beaches on the northern Dead Sea, their only entry point to the sea. The petition highlights the fact that the checkpoint was established following complaints by Israelis managing beaches in the area, who claim that a "mix" of patrons at their beaches hurts business. Not only does the checkpoint constitute a severe infringement on freedom of movement, but the racist basis for the violation makes it blatantly illegal. Read an in-depth article that appeared in The Independent on ACRI's petition by clicking here. Photo by Miki Kratzman.
 
ACRI newsletter in Arabic

We are happy to announce that ACRI published the first edition of its e-newsletter in Arabic in May. If you would like to receive the mailing every three months, please contact Alaa Yosef, ACRI's Outreach and Media Coordinator for the Arab Community, at alaa@acri.org.il.
 
ACRI's Public Hotline

ACRI operates a “Public Hotline” for consultation and information on rights entitlement: 02-6521218 (Jerusalem and the south), 03-5608185 (Tel Aviv, the Sharon area and the center of the country), and 04-8526333/4/5 (Haifa and the north of the country).
 
 
© ACRI 2008
The Association for Civil Rights in Israel
PO Box 34510
Jerusalem 91000
Israel

Tel: +972-2-652-1218
Fax: +972-2-652-1219
E-mail: mail@acri.org.il
www.acri.org.il

Click here to make a secure online donation to ACRI.

 
 
A letter from Rachel Benziman,
ACRI's Executive Director


Dear Friends,

The past two months at ACRI have been busy ones, filled with intensive activity on all fronts: legal, education, and public outreach, both in Israel and abroad. In this edition of ACRI's newsletter, we have focused on civil liberties and the progress ACRI has made in ensuring that all individuals in Israel can realize these rights. Please read more to find out how ACRI is setting the standards for enhanced protection of the right to privacy, freedom of speech, and freedom to demonstrate in Israel.

This issue is also the last time I will be writing to you as ACRI's executive director. After seven years at ACRI, with more than five of those as Executive Director, I have decided to leave ACRI and forge a new path in my life. It has been an immensely rewarding and humbling experience leading an organization as important and influential as ACRI. I feel proud and privileged to be part of an incredibly dedicated and talented team of people, all of whom share the common goal of building a more just and equitable society and who work tirelessly to achieve this end.

I am leaving ACRI in good hands: Hagai El-Ad will assume his position as executive director in July 2008. Hagai brings to ACRI much experience as a leader in the Israeli human rights community, most recently as the first executive director of the Jerusalem Open House, the central community and advocacy center for the city's Gay and Lesbian community. During his tenure there, he launched the Jerusalem Gay Pride March and became a prominent spokesperson for Gay and Lesbian rights in Israel as well as for human rights in general.

I would like to take this opportunity to express my deep appreciation for your ongoing support of ACRI. As you know, our work in this volatile region can be very challenging; your commitment to our cause gives us strength in our struggle to foster a more just and democratic society. 

With Best Wishes,

Rachel Benziman

 
 
Challenging "Big Brother"

In April, ACRI submitted an urgent petition to the Supreme Court, to cancel the "Communication Data Law," which would give police unlimited access to the contact information of individual citizens – not necessarily connected to crimes – through an exhaustive database. The law received the nickname, the "Big Brother Law," because it would give the police access to contact information from private enterprises such as telephone companies and Internet service providers on any individual in Israel, an unprecedented invasion of privacy. When the law was being drafted, ACRI attempted to prevent its legislation. Though the bill was eventually passed, ACRI's legal intervention in the Knesset caused the final parameters of the database to be much smaller and its scope much less intrusive than originally planned. At a hearing on the petition in June, the Court said it would rule on whether it would issue a show-cause order.

 
 

A Precedent in the Right to Demonstrate

Following a petition submitted jointly by ACRI and representatives of Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, the Beersheba District Court ordered the university in April to cancel its regulation forbidding students from demonstrating about political or controversial issues on campus. The petition was submitted when a group of students from the Beersheba university were prevented from protesting the violation of rights of university employees. This victory constitutes a critical precedent which will safeguard the civil rights of all current and future Ben-Gurion University students and employees.
 
 

Fighting Limitations on Freedom of Expression

 The Knesset is currently considering draft legislation known as "The Talkback Law" which would require Web site owners to censure certain responses to articles posted on Web sites known as “talkbacks.” In an op-ed published on Ynet, a leading Israeli news site, ACRI Attorney Avner Pinchuk claimed that talkbacks are a unique and important form of expression and limiting the public’s ability to respond on such sites would constitute a severe violation of freedom of expression. To read the translation of the full article, click here.
 
 
Privacy in the Workplace


As new technologies and the Internet become more pervasive in our lives, the right to privacy is being breached systematically in the private and professional spheres. In May, ACRI provided its expert testimony as a "friend of the court" in a petition challenging a decision in a lower court endorsing a claim that employers have the right to read their employees' emails. ACRI argued that the right to privacy in the workplace is a prerequisite for the right to live and work in dignity, and all employees should be able to feel secure that their privacy will be respected at a reasonable level.
 
 
ACRI Addresses International Conference on Counterterrorism and Human Rights

In April, ACRI Attorney Lila Margalit was invited to address an international conference on counterterrorism and human rights at Yale University. Delegates from around the world discussed progressive responses to post 9/11 counterterrorism policies during the two-day forum. The conference was sponsored by the National Litigation Project of Yale's International Human Rights Clinic. 

Below is an excerpt from ACRI's address to the conference, entitled "Administrative Detention in Israel and the Occupied Territories":

Any discussion of the Israeli experience with counterterrorism measures or preventive detention must first, of course, account for the ongoing, prolonged occupation of the Occupied Territories (OT). On one level, the Israeli experience is that of a democracy, dealing like other Western democracies with the dilemma of balancing human rights with security concerns. On another, it is the experience of a society that has been occupying another people for over forty years - nearly half a century - subjecting them to a military regime that lacks the most basic protections.

While 9/11 has had an undeniable impact on anti-terrorism legislation and practices in Israel - and perhaps more than anything else on a sort of general sense that the limit of what is acceptable has changed - the vast majority of the measures used predate 9/11 by many years - and changes have reflected, more than anything else, ups and downs in the Arab-Israeli conflict, and political changes like the disengagement from the Gaza Strip.

To read the full text of the presentation, click here.