Legal processes

A Tel Aviv District court on Tuesday sentenced Abbas el-Sayid to 35
consecutive life terms for master-minding the bombing of the Park Hotel in
Netanya on Passover 2002 that killed 30 Israelis, and for a suicide bombing at
the Netanya mall in 2001 that killed five. El-Sayid was captured in an
operation by Israeli forces in the West Bank. It is IDF policy to capture
terrorists if possible, rather than kill them, but often it is not possible.
El-Sayid confessed to the crimes and proudly claimed responsibility. He
refused to participate in the court proceedings, but was represented by an
Israeli lawyer. Note that contrary to the proceedings in some countries this
terrorist organizer was tried in a civil not a military court.
Recently there has been another spate of uprooting and cutting of olive trees
on the West Bank. Last week another hundred trees were apparently damaged.
Acting PM Ehud Olmert himself spoke out against this form of vandalism. The
IDF has become dissatisfied by the response of the Judea and Samaria police in
catching the culprits of these incidents. The police say that they cannot
spare men to guard Palestinian olive groves at night, its too dangerous and
costly. Nevertheless, the IDF caught a settler at night with olive branches
in his truck. He is being held pending a possible charge against him for
destroying property.
The situation is however very complex. First, in order to be able to
prosecute these crimes in civilian courts, Israel was forced a few years ago
to extend Israeli law to the occupied territories, otherwise they would have
to be prosecuted under military occupation law. This was of course protested
by the Palestinians, event though it is in their interests. Second, the
Settler Council claims that the Palestinians have been found in several cases
to have destroyed their own trees in order to claim and receive compensation
from the Israeli Government (one farmer received $50,000). Finally, it is the
time of the year when the farmers severely prune their trees, often back to
the trunk, leaving no branches. To the untrained eye this looks like
sabotage, but is standard agricultural practice. It is possible that the
Israeli who was arrested merely collected branches from a grove that had been
pruned. So whereas anti-Israel activists delight in claiming that the Jewish
settlers are responsible for harassing the Palestinian farmers and destroying
their property, the situation might be quite different from that. We should
reserve judgment while the courts take their course.
Although prosecuting terrorists is far more important than damage to olive
trees, nonetheless, this also has to be legislated. Any Palestinian (who is
not even a citizen of Israel) can bring a case against an Israeli or the
Government, and some cases have gone all the way to the Israeli Supreme Court
in Jerusalem. Examples of this include cases against the location of the
security barrier in the vicinity of Jerusalem, where the original route chosen
by the IDF from a security perspective was opposed by Palestinians and in some
cases Israelis, and was re-routed, sometimes at great expense to the Israeli
State and considerable time delay. How many countries would allow such a
situation, where the location of a protective security barrier is determined
ostensibly by the enemies it is being erected to protect against. We are a
country of laws!