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The Grand Zionist Robbery of Palestinian Property

By Dr. Zuhair Sabbagh | August 23, 2021

The following research article will deal with the issue of Palestinian property and its relationship with the Zionist settler bourgeoisie. Furthermore, it will tackle both the Palestinian property that was captured by the Zionist military armies in the period 1948-1949 and the Palestinian property that was legally owned by the Palestinians who were allowed to stay and who became Israeli citizens.

Moreover, this research article will tackle the issue of Palestinian property inside the colonized West Bank, including the area of East Jerusalem.

It is necessary, at this stage, to begin my analysis by providing a brief legal introduction to the issue of property, specifically, when it falls under belligerent military occupation.

International Law and Private and Public Property

In cases of belligerent occupations, the Hague Convention of 1907 and the Fourth Geneva Convention of 1949, are applicable international law tools. In the occupation of the West Bank, the Gaza Strip, and the Golan Heights, the Zionist authorities have violated numerous articles of these conventions. I will not deal with all these violations, nor will I deal with all the occupied territories, but will confine my research to the articles that are relevant to Palestinian private and public property inside Israel as well as inside the colonized West Bank.

Both the Fourth Geneva and Hague Conventions prohibit the belligerent occupiers from violating the rights to private property of Protected Persons. “Article 46 of the Hague Convention of 1907 provides that an occupying power must respect private property, which cannot be confiscated.”1 While,

Article 53 of the Fourth Geneva Convention prohibits any destruction of real or private property whether belonging to private individual(s), the state or another organization, except when rendered absolutely necessary by military operations.2

Israel and Palestinian Property in 1948

After the conclusion of the grand campaign of ethnic cleansing in Palestine3, the Zionist authorities began to debate the policies they should adopt regarding the massive property that was left by the Palestinian refugees.

During the war that began on November 30, 1947 and ended on July 30, 1949, the State of Israel was a poor state in its first steps and had a great deal of war booty: about 77% of the land of Israel was the assets of the Palestinian refugees …4

Two months after the establishment of the State of Israel,

[t]he Provisional State Council, which was the legislative authority of the State of Israel from the end of the British Mandate until the establishment of the Knesset, established emergency regulations regarding the assets of the absentees … and appointed, on 21/07/1948, D. Shafir to be the custodian of the absentee property. Thus, the Palestinians’ connection to their land was erased, with the definition of “absentees” legitimizing the takeover of the assets. …5

In a report written in 1949, the newly appointed “Custodian of Absentee Property” described the situation on the ground as follows:

The frightened escape of the Arab residents and the abandoning of vast property in hundreds of thousands of apartments, shops, warehouses and workshops, the abandoning of grains in the fields, and fruit in gardens, orchards and vineyards, all during the war… put the victorious army in the face of severe material temptation…6

As it will become clearer later, the appointment of the “Custodian of Absentee Property” was not meant to take care of refugee property until the resolution of their problem, then the return of their property to their legitimate owners. But in actuality, it meant the plunder of the refugee property and its transfer to the Zionist state and private ownership. This Zionist conduct was a despicable thievery of the property that rightfully belonged to the Palestinian Arab refugees, the legitimate owners.

In 1950, the Absentee Property Law was enacted, according to which all assets owned by Palestinian refugees were transferred to the state of Israel through the custodian of absentee property. His powers were expanded by regulations that were in place until the law was enacted. In doing so, this institution was given great power. In addition, in close proximity to the Absentee Property Law, the Development Authority (Asset Transfer) Law was enacted in 1950, in order to sell the assets to a third party, i.e., laundering the absentee’s assets and erasing the Palestinians’ affiliation with the land. 7

Consequently,

At the time of the application of the Development Authority Law, the custodian sold most of the absentee property to Development Authority, and the Development Authority sold the land to the public and government institutions. As part of the mechanism for transferring agricultural assets – over 2.5 million dunams of absentee property including Waqf assets – were sold by the custodian to the Development Authority, which in turn sold it to the JNF, which transferred most of these resources to the (Jewish) farmers. 8

The Massive Plunder of the Lands of Palestinian Arab Citizens

The Zionist settler bourgeoisie did not only plunder the property of the Palestinian refugees, but decided to plunder also the property of the Palestinians whom they decided to let them stay and who were granted Israeli citizenship. The Zionist laws that were enacted for the “absentees” did not apply for the citizens, so, the Zionist authorities enacted suitable laws for this grand robbery.

In a matter of few years, the lands of the Palestinian citizens were plundered with the help of Zionist colonial laws. This massive robbery, which was a typical settler colonial conduct, was justified under the false “security” pretense.

Subsequently, in 1953, the State of Israel enacted the Land Acquisition Law, which led to massive expropriations by the Development Authority and the dispossession of 1.2 million dunams of municipal and agricultural land of the “present absentees” (absentee property law of 1950 did not apply to them) …9

In actuality, the concise land area that was expropriated by the Zionist authorities from the Palestinian Arab citizens totaled 1,234,785 dunams. This official number was released, in 1955, by Zionist Minister of Finance, Levi Eshkol, in response to a query by Israeli Communist Party member of Knesset Shmuel Mikonis.10

At the government meeting regarding the sale of land to the JNF, Minister Pinchas Rosen noted that the Development Authority must be rushed and established, because formally only it is entitled to sell these lands. Finance Minister Kaplan demanded that the seller be not the custodian of absentee property, but the Development Authority.11 The reason for this is the desire to make it difficult to locate the original owners of the land and to protect its new owners from future claims by the refugees to reclaim the land.

Moreover, Uzi Lovia added that,

Money laundering was the initial goal of the establishment, while reducing the value of compensation for future Palestinian claims was the secondary goal, as reflected in a secret memo to the Minister of Finance by the Jerusalem District Supervisor, which emphasizes the need to eliminate absentee property – with an emphasis on the problematic value of the assets and/or by free market prices. “In addition to the economic problem of saying prices, the possibility of lowering the prices of real estate assets across the country in general should be checked by flooding the market with absentee property at a reduced price,” he said. 12

Consequently, Uzi Lovia further explained that,

This policy applies more strongly to the development authority’s assets transferred to the JNF. In a memorandum by Finance Minister Kaplan in honor of the Director of the State Assets Department, regarding the consideration for the land transferred to the JNF as part of the million dunams (JNF purchased over 2 million dunams and received the territories in two installments), he writes that “the announcement by the Existing Fund that the prices that will be declared on them in the estate’s offices and which will be recorded in the bank of sale will be two-thirds of the prices set by the Committee – correct.”13 Is the Minister of Finance’s declaration and the action that followed legal?

It should be pointed out that the material compensation that the Zionist regime was ready to pay, for the legitimate Palestinian land owners, was decided upon in a way to be “of no real value”.

The Land Acquisition Law of 1952 was rife with covert intentions. Weitz writes: “It is not the owners who are guilty that the state did not pay for their land at the time of their seizure … The landowners, those who wish to remain citizens of Israel – will be severely deprived, the money they will receive for their assets will lack real value … From what was previously mentioned, it is understandable that the monetary value of the absentee assets is low, because the calculation of the value of compensation for the expropriation of the assets is determined from January 1, 1950. The range of years has improved the value of the assets, yet the absentees did not receive the proper value … Moreover, at the time of the application of the law, the Israeli Lira lost 80% of its value and the value of the land in 1953 was 15 times its value in 1950. 14

That was Zionist double robbery, of both land and in the price of compensations. All Zionist thievery was carried out under suitable settler colonial laws.

Consequently, and as a result of the massive expropriation of their lands,

… Israeli Arabs, who make up 21% of the population, control less than 3% of the country’s land. 97% of the land was taken out of their hands. Ben-Gurion was not satisfied with transferring ownership of the registered land, he wanted to change the registration in the consciousness as well: He declared in 1949 “We must also remove the Arabic names for political reasons. Just as we do not recognize the political ownership of Arabs in Israel, we do not recognize their spiritual ownership and their names.” 15

In addition to the plunder of the lands of the Palestinian private owners, the Zionist authorities categorized the Palestinian custodians of the “Muslim Waqf” as “absentees” also, therefore their property could be massively expropriated and sold to the Zionist ministries and municipalities. According to Israeli writer Uzi Lovia,

… the Representatives of The Muslims in Jaffa and the other cities involved received 1% of the total endowment assets scattered throughout the country, and were sold and/or transferred by the guardian to the Development Authority, for which it sold them to a third party – the Ministry of Agriculture, the Ministry of Defense, the Ministry of Religions and Municipalities…16

After the end of the major wave of Zionist ethnic cleansing in 1949, most of the Palestinian Arabs who remained inside Palestine were land owners who made their living from agriculture.

Consequently, the massive expropriations of their lands in the early 1950s led to structural changes in their economy and produced major changes in the class pyramid of the Palestinian society. It converted these farmers into unskilled workers who sought work inside Israeli cities.

Zionist Plunder of Palestinian West Bank Land

According to International Law and specifically to the Hague Convention of 1907, and to article 46 of this Convention, “Private property … must be respected and … cannot be confiscated.”17

In a research work carried out, in 2002, by B’Tselem, an Israeli human rights organization, the Zionist settler bourgeoisie adopted five types of methods to plunder Palestinian-owned land.18

• 1. Seizure for Military Needs;
  2. Employment of the Ottoman Law Code of 1858;
  3. Absentee Property;
  4. Expropriation for Public Needs;
  5. Acquisition of Land on the Free Market.

According to an estimation mentioned by Israeli researcher Joseph Algazy,

… from 1967 to 1984 the Israeli government requisitioned an estimated 5,500,000 dunams, or roughly half the total area of the West Bank, setting aside much of the land for military training and camping areas. 19

Apparently, the process of Zionist plunder of Palestinian land inside the colonized West Bank was carried out in various illegal ways. However, one of these ways was done according to a “fake legality” that is based on trickery. One example is to apply the old Ottoman “Land Registration Law of 1858” but only after creating conducive circumstances.

This Ottoman land law classified land under five categories. One of these categories is called the “mahlul” which stipulates that private land will revert to the state if left uncultivated by the owner for three consecutive years or left vacant.20

An example on the application of this law is what happened to the land of Ahmad Qaddoura, a Palestinian from the village of Laqef, the colonized West Bank. To begin with, almost half of his land was expropriated a decade ago for Israeli military facilities, including a watchtower.21 Later on, the rest of the land was expropriated through the misuse of this Ottoman law.

It should be mentioned that this land was cultivated with wheat prior to 1967.22 However, “… it was not possible” for the Qaddoura family members “to enter their land due to its closeness to the adjacent Karnei Shomron settlement.”23 One day the father of the family tried to plow his land, but was attacked by settlers and his plow was confiscated.24

Consequently, the Qaddoura family was forced, by the Zionist settler colonialists of the Karnei Shomron settlement, to abandon their land and not cultivate it for three consecutive years. Then, the Zionist colonial authorities applied the “Land Registration Law of 1858” that stipulates that land will revert to the state if left uncultivated for three years or left vacant.25 So, in 1986 a Zionist court issued a ruling that converted Qaddoura’s land into a state land, because the Qaddoura family “left their land uncultivated for three years”.26 Later on, the Zionist colonial authorities granted this land to the colonial settlers of Karnei Shomron who wanted to establish a factory on it.

Apparently, Zionist colonial courts do not feel legally obligated to take into consideration the circumstances that forced the Qaddoura family to abandon their land and leave it uncultivated for three years. Zionist colonial courts act according to the colonial tricks of “fake legality”. This colonial plunder by the Zionist State will appear, in Israeli eyes, “legal” because it has been carried out in accordance with the law. Collusion between the Zionist colonial courts and the settler colonialists of Karnei Shomron comes afterwards to an established colonial fact on the ground. The last stage of this colonial trickery is carried out discreetly by the Zionist colonial industrial bourgeoisie which invests in establishing a factory on robbed private Palestinian land. The Zionist army acts as enforcer of and protector of settler colonial schemes. In the end, all these colonial tools carry out their colonial roles in a complicit manner.

The Liquidation of Muslim Waqf Property

To begin with, the Islamic Waqf property is an “… Islamic property held in sacred trust for religious purposes…”27 for schools, public kitchens, mosques and libraries.28 According to International Law that is applicable inside occupied territories, specifically, articles 46 and 56 of the Hague Convention of 1907, it is forbidden to demolish and expropriate private property.29

Already in 1948, Israeli Zionist colonialists have never recognized the Palestinian rights bequeathed by Islamic Trust endowment. They regarded Waqf property as public property, or absentee property that can be expropriated by the Zionist state.

American author, Michael Dumper, calculated West Bank Waqf properties as exceeding 600,000 dunams…30 By the year 2013, Israeli settler colonialists were estimated to have expropriated more than 104,996 dunams of Waqf property mostly around Jerrico. 31

The Demolishment of the Moroccan Quarter

It should be pointed out that the Hague Convention of 1907 is applicable to the Palestinian occupied territories. According to Art. 46 of this Convention, “Private property … must be respected and … cannot be confiscated.”32

Moreover, According to Art. 56 of the Hague Convention of 190733,

The property of municipalities, that of institutions dedicated to religion, charity and education, the arts and sciences, even when State property, shall be treated as private property.

All seizure of, destruction or willful damage done to institutions of this character, historic monuments, works of art and science, is forbidden, and should be made the subject of legal proceedings.

Prior to the Zionist occupation of East Jerusalem in 1967, “Harat al-Magharibah” (the Moroccan Quarter) was one of the famous historical neighborhoods of East Jerusalem. It dates back to the end of the Crusaders wars.34

The entire Moroccan Quarter was endowed as Muslim waqf for the Maghribi community in recognition for the contribution of the Maghribis who fought with Salah Edin against the Crusaders.35

In the last day of the 1967 war, the Zionist authorities represented by Teddy Kollek, the “liberal” mayor of West Jerusalem, took two decisions, first to demolish the entire Moroccan Quarter and second to evacuate by force the Palestinian inhabitants of the “Jewish” Quarter.

On Saturday night, June 10, 1967, Israeli authorities informed more than 100 families living in the Moroccan Quarter of Jerusalem’s Old City that they had three hours to evacuate their homes, where some had lived for generations.36

In total, the Zionist authorities demolished 135 houses, two mosques,37 schools, Muslim institutions and Sufi orders.38

Around 650 persons who resided in these houses, became refugees in East Jerusalem, the West Bank, and Jordan, while some of them returned to Morocco.39

Later on, Teddy Kollek turned to the “Jewish” Quarter and decided to

… remove forcibly all the Palestinian Arab inhabitants of the Old City’s Jewish Quarter, many of whom had fled there from parts of the city taken over by the Israelis… Never mind that the vast majority of buildings in the Jewish Quarter were Arab-owned at the time of the 1948 war. …40

That was another crime of despicable theft of Palestinian owned property, coupled with the crime of ethnic cleansing. Both incidents reveal how Zionist settler colonialists have no respect for Palestinian human beings and that they are ready to displace them and rob their property without remorse or human compassion.

It should be pointed out that Zionist insolence dare to claim that Palestinians are not attached to their city nor to their houses and that they are ready to receive money and vacate. According to Zionist logic, the attachment of settler colonialist thieves to the property they robbed, is stronger than the attachment of the indigenous people to their lands, villages and cities. Teddy Kollek claimed, in his biography that, “Jerusalem meant less to the Arabs”41 While former Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir claimed that “Jerusalem has a “political, national significance for Jews, as opposed to a religious, almost imaginative significance for Muslims and Christians.”42

Since the beginning of Zionist occupation of the West Bank, expropriation and annexation of Palestinian owned property was an ongoing process. Expropriation was carried out under various pretexts and for different purposes, but Palestinian land kept being robbed and plundered then annexed to Zionist settlements.

In his public speech against annexation, Israeli Advocate Michael Spharad stated the following:

Annexation is an elaborate and new mechanism that will enable the expropriation and dispossession and displacement of Palestinians at a scale and pace that we did not know. When East Jerusalem was annexed, thousands of properties were declared absentee property and thousands of dunams were expropriated for so-called “public purposes.” And who is the public who is in his best interests these properties were expropriated? Of course, settlers. This happened in East Jerusalem, and this will definitely happen in the territories annexed in the West Bank if there will be annexation.43

According to the writer Ali Kadri,

By 1983, the expropriation was calculated to extend over 52% of the territory, most of its prime agricultural land and, just before the 1993 Oslo Accords, these confiscations had encompassed over three quarters of the West Bank.44

Waqf Muslim property in the colonized West Bank was plundered by the Zionist colonial authorities. When Palestinian Muslims protested this plunder and demanded their return, the Zionist colonial authorities were ready to return a very small portion of the Waqf land.

This outright thievery by the Zionist authorities was affirmed by the Israeli researcher Uzi Tovia who reported the following fact.

Needless to say, representatives of Muslims in Jaffa and the other mixed cities received 1% of the total endowment assets scattered throughout the country, and were sold and/or transferred by the guardian to the Development Authority, which on its part sold them to a third party – the Ministry of Agriculture, the Ministry of Defense, the Ministry of Religious Affairs and Municipalities…45

Moreover, Uzi Tovia points out that the enactment of a number of land laws in Israel, is a reflection of the continued process of plunder and theft. These laws have led to the deteriorating share of the Palestinian citizens in the total lands under the control of the state of Israel.

As noted, the State of Israel enacted land laws that legitimized the nationalization and laundering of the absentee’s assets. Today, the of Nationality Law, the Kaminitz Law and the application of sovereignty in Judea, Samaria and the Jordan Valley constitute the continuation of the theft and plunder. If the long-awaited peace reaches our country, then the State of Israel will tell the Palestinian refugees, the original landowners, that the possibility of returning the land to the absentee is legally impossible due to the large transfer of ownership of the land. Today, Israeli Arabs, who make up 21% of the population, control less than 3% of the country’s land. 97% of the land was taken out of their hands. Ben-Gurion was not satisfied with transferring ownership of the land registration, he wanted to change the registration in the consciousness as well: “We must also remove the Arabic names for political reasons. Just as we do not recognize the political ownership of Arabs in Israel, we do not recognize their spiritual ownership and their names,” he declared in 1949. 46

The Failed Policy of Demographic Containment

It should be emphasized that the present demographic situation of Palestinian cities, towns and villages is that of overcrowding, suffocation, lack of open spaces, and lack of plots of land for construction. This deplorable situation has been brought about by Zionist colonial policy of plunder of Palestinian owned land. The racist undertone of this policy could be clearly seen when we compare Palestinian residential localities with Jewish residential localities.

The Zionist regime realized that the policy of demographic containment of Palestinian citizens has failed. Palestinian citizens succeeded in infiltrating the all-Jewish cities of Nof Hagalil and Karmiel that were established specifically to contain Palestinian demographic expansion. Moreover, Palestinian citizens began to find solutions to their housing problems also inside neighbouring Jewish cities such as Haifa, Acre, and Afula. The failure of the Zionist racist policy of demographic containment was the direct result of the colonial policies of the massive land expropriations that took place in the fifties and sixties. By depriving the Palestinian Arab villages of their lands, the Zionist state has led to the creation of demographic overcrowding inside every Palestinian city and village. Available lands for housing and development have disappeared and land prices skyrocketed. Lack of available housing solutions drove lots of Palestinian citizens to migrate to the all-Jewish cities that have plenty of residential solutions.

Comparison Among Some Settler-Colonial Projects

When a comparison is conducted among the five settler colonial projects in the USA, Canada, French Algeria, South Africa and Israel – it would show a set of common similarities and another set of common differences.

Common Similarities

All settler colonial projects are based on the ideology of settler colonialism which produce the assumed racial superiority of the colonial settlers and the assumed racial inferiority of the indigenous population. Ultimately, this racial dichotomy leads to the dehumanization of the indigenous population. Its conduct towards the indigenous population cannot but reflect this ideology.

All settler colonialist projects begin their initial step by the destruction of the indigenous economy and the dissolution of indigenous societies. Then they begin the establishment of settler colonies on the plundered land of the indigenous population.

In their conduct, all settler colonial projects are motivated by the practice of segregation, walls, towers, fencing, closed zones, closed racist villages and racist ghettoes inside mixed cities.

Throughout its socio-political development, racist conduct becomes inherent in: law, courts, ministries, government agencies, official media, universities, the educational system, police treatment of indigenous population, land allocation, budget allocation, commerce, transportation and political narrative of its leaders.

These settler colonial regimes pursue an aggressive colonialist policy towards the indigenous population that gives no respect for their old traditions, religious beliefs and shrines.

The pursued colonialist policy does not recognize the previous regulations and laws that guided indigenous population prior to the advance of the aggressive settler colonial project.

Moreover, the pursued colonialist policy does not recognize the title of indigenous ownership for lands, whether private, public, or state. All indigenous lands are bound to be plundered by means of expropriation.

When faced with indigenous resistance, the leaders of the settler colonial project, the settlers, and the military agencies, resort to vicious violence, massacres, ethnic cleansing and genocide.

Common Differences

When it comes to the differences, there are a number of differences that stem from: stages of the socio-economic development of the colonial metropolis, the degree of resistance paused by the indigenous population to the settler colonial project, and the end result of the settler indigenous conflict.

We could notice different degrees of “success” in three settler colonial projects such as in the United States of America, Canada and Australia. The settler colonial project “succeeded” in annihilating the Indigenous Population, through the use of ethnic cleansing, massive massacres and general genocide. According to Australian expert researcher on settler colonialism, Patrick Wolfe, the primary motive that stood behind annihilation was the following.

… Whatever settlers may say— and they generally have a lot to say—the primary motive for elimination is not race (or religion, ethnicity, grade of civilization, etc.) but access to territory. Territoriality is settler colonialism’s specific, irreducible element.47

Concluding Remarks

Apparently, Zionist legal-minded political leaders, lawyers, and jurists deeply thought about the proper cover and moral justification for the plundering of the property of Palestinian Arab refugees and citizens. All their efforts could not produce a suitable solution except the provision of a thin veneer of fake legality. But how can you justify outright thievery with laws? Only a racist frame of mind of some colonialists thought that such a fallacy could be convincing.

After seventy-three years of Zionist settler colonialism, one can conclude that the Zionist settler bourgeoisie did not even once plan to achieve genuine peace with its Arab neighbors or with the Palestinian Arab people. The Zionist settler bourgeoisie opted in 1948 for the plunder of refugee property and this option totally negated the establishment of a genuine peace.

All Zionist talk about their desire for peace and about the extended hand for peace of Zionist leaders are nothing but Zionist propaganda. The Zionists have never thought of achieving genuine peace because their hand was extended only to grab Palestinian Arab lands. They thought that being militarily powerful is a state that could last forever and they regarded the support provided by Western imperialism to be guaranteed forever. They also thought that the rising Arab resistance to Zionist settler colonialism can be forever contained and managed.

Finally, the Zionist regime cannot but be a settler colonialist regime. Its conduct regarding the indigenous population and indigenous land remains colonial and aggressive. This regime cannot change by itself, it becomes callous and more inhuman. It will deteriorate and become more vicious, more violent and more racist.

Zuhair Sabbagh is a Palestinian Arab author specialized in Palestinian, Israeli and Third World issues. He lives in Nazareth, Israel. He worked for 21 years as an academic at the Bir Zeit University, at the department of social and behavioral studies. He is a graduate of the University of Manchester and holds a Ph.D. in Political Sociology. He is author of a number of books and research articles.

1 Natalie Sedacca, “Sanctioning land expropriation in the Occupied Palestinian Territory – Israel’s new ‘Land Regularization Law’’, https://lphr.org.uk, 3-3-2017

2 Ibid.

3 Actually, Zionist ethnic cleansing did not start in 1948, but preceded that in many years. In 1907, a Zionist by the name of Yitshaq Epstein reported that Zionist settlers ethnically cleansed the Palestinian Arab residents of two villages, Al-Ja’uny and Al-Mtilli. Then Zionist settlers settled inside the evacuated Palestinian Arab houses. Moreover, Zionist ethnic cleansing did not stop in 1949, but still continues to this very day inside Israel’s June 4th., 1967 borders and also inside the colonized West Bank (ZS).

4 Lovia, Uzi, “Behind the concept of laundering absentee property”, (in Hebrew), https://www.haokets.org, 14-8-2020

5 Proposal for absentee property ordinance on behalf of Justice Minister Felix Rosenblit to members of the government, dated 04/09/1948. As quoted by: Lovia, Uzi, “Behind the Concept of Laundering Absentee Property”, (in Hebrew), https://www.haokets.org, 14-8-2020

6 Report on operations until 31/03/1949 on behalf of the Custodian of Absentee Property, Ministry of Finance. As quoted by Lovia, Uzi, “Behind the concept of laundering absentee property”, (in Hebrew), https://www.haokets.org, 14-8-2020

7 Lovia, Uzi, “Behind the Concept of Laundering Absentee Property”, (in Hebrew), https://www.haokets.org, 14-8-2020

8 Ibid.

9 Ibid.

10 As reported by “Kol Ha’am”, Voice of the People (in Hebrew), 3-2-1955. As was quoted by Lovia, Uzi, “Behind the Concept of Laundering Absentee Property”, (in Hebrew), https://www.haokets.org, 14-8-2020

11 A cabinet meeting regarding the sale of land to the JNF by the Development Authority, dated 05/10/1950.  As quoted by: Lovia, Uzi, “Behind the Concept of Laundering Absentee Property”, (in Hebrew), https://www.haokets.org, 14-8-2020

12 Lovia, Uzi, “Behind the Concept of Laundering Absentee Property”, (in Hebrew), https://www.haokets.org, 14-8-2020

13 Memorandum by Minister of Finance Kaplan regarding the consideration for land that goes to the JNF as part of the million Dunams, dated 22/01/1952. As quoted by: Lovia, Uzi, “Behind the Concept of Laundering Absentee Property”, (in Hebrew), https://www.haokets.org, 14-8-2020

14 Lovia, Uzi, “Behind the Concept of Laundering Absentee Property”, (in Hebrew), https://www.haokets.org, 14-8-2020

15 Ibid.

16 Ibid.

17 The Hague Regulations of 1907, “CONVENTION RESPECTING THE LAWS AND CUSTOMS OF WAR ON LAND”, https://constitution.com. Retrieved on: 13-8-2021

18 Wikipedia, “Land expropriation in the West Bank”, https://en.wikipedia.org. Retrieved on: 27-6-2021

19 Algazy, Joseph (Spring-Summer 1985). “Israeli Settlement Policy in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.” Arab Studies Quarterly, 7(2-3): 62-73 JSTOR 41857769, p.66. As quoted by: Wikipedia, “Land expropriation in the West Bank”, https://en.wikipedia.org. Retrieved on: 18-8-2021

20 LeVine, Mark (2005). Overthrowing geography: Jaffa, Tel Aviv, and the struggle for Palestine, 1880-1948. Berkeley: University of California Press. p. 184.  As quoted by Wikipedia, “Ottoman Land Code of 1858”, https://en.wikipedia.org. Retrieved on: 3-7-2021

21 Al-Bazz, Ahmad, “Settlers are seizing ‘empty’ land. The Palestinian owners are fighting back”, https://www.972mag.com, 7-1-2020

22 Ibid.

23 Ibid.

24 Ibid.

25 LeVine, Mark (2005). Overthrowing geography: Jaffa, Tel Aviv, and the struggle for Palestine, 1880-1948. Berkeley: University of California Press. p. 184.  As quoted by Wikipedia, “Ottoman Land Code of 1858”, https://en.wikipedia.org. Retrieved on: 3-7-2021

26 Al-Bazz, Ahmad, “Settlers are seizing ‘empty’ land. The Palestinian owners are fighting back”, https://www.972mag.com, 7-1-2020

27 Wikipedia, “Land expropriation in the West Bank”, https://en.wikipedia.org. Retrieved on: 27-6-2021

28 Halil Deligöz (2014). “The legacy of vakıf institutions and the management of social policy in Turkey”. Administrative Culture. Retrieved 15 September 2015. As quoted by Wikipedia, “Waqf”, https://en.wikipedia.org. Retrieved on: 27-6-2021

29 The Hague Regulations of 1907, “CONVENTION RESPECTING THE LAWS AND CUSTOMS OF WAR ON LAND”, https://constitution.com. Retrieved on: 13-8-2021

30 Ehrenreich, Ben (2016). The Way to the Spring: Life and Death in Palestine. Granta Books. ISBN 978-1-783-78312-0, p. 292. As quoted by Wikipedia, “Land expropriation in the West Bank”, https://en.wikipedia.org. Retrieved on: 27-6-2021

31 Ibid.

32 The Hague Regulations of 1907, “CONVENTION RESPECTING THE LAWS AND CUSTOMS OF WAR ON LAND”, https://constitution.com. Retrieved on: 13-8-2021

33 Ibid.

34 Hatem, Bazian, “Israel’s Grand Theft of Muslim Endowments in Jerusalem”, http://www.hatembazian.com, 3-2-2016

35 Ibid.

36 Joost R Hiltermann “Teddy Kollek and the Native Question,” Middle East Report 182 (May/June 1993).

37 The demolishment of the Moroccan Quarter, a copy reserved on Y-Pack Machine, 4-2-2012. As quoted by Wikipedia, “The Moroccan Quarter”, (in Arabic), https://ar.wikipedia.org. Retrieved on: 1-7-2021

38 Hatem , Bazian, “Israel’s Grand Theft of Muslim Endowments in Jerusalem”, http://www.hatembazian.com, 3-2-2016

39 The Jerusalem City Website, “54 years on the demolishment of the Moroccan Quarter, the Occupation continues to Judaize the place in order to conceal its history”, (in Arabic), https://www.alquds-city.com. Retrieved on: 10-6-2021

40 Ibid.

41 Kollek, Teddy, with Kollek, Amos, For Jerusalem: A Life (New York: Random House, 1978), p. 2. As quoted by Joost R Hiltermann “Teddy Kollek and the Native Question,” Middle East Report 182 (May/June 1993).

42 Jerusalem Post, May 24, 1990. As quoted by Joost R Hiltermann “Teddy Kollek and the Native Question,” Middle East Report 182 (May/June 1993)

43 Spharad, Michael, “Annexation is conquest and dispossession”, (in Hebrew), https://www.haokets.org, 8-6-2020

44 Kadri, Ali (Autumn 1998). “A Survey of Commuting Labor from the West Bank to Israel”. Middle East Journal. 52 (4): 517–530. JSTOR 4329251., pp. 517–518. As quoted by Wikipedia, “Land expropriation in the West Bank”, https://en.wikipedia.org. Retrieved on: 27-6-2021

45 Lovia, Uzi, “Behind the Concept of Laundering Absentee Property”, (in Hebrew), https://www.haokets.org, 14-8-2020

46 Lovia, Uzi, “Behind the Concept of Laundering Absentee Property”, (in Hebrew), https://www.haokets.org, 14-8-2020

47 Wolfe, Patrick, “Settler colonialism and the elimination of the native”,  Journal of Genocide Research, https://www.tandfonline.com/loi/cjgr20. Retrieved on: 18-8-2021

August 22, 2021 Posted by aletho | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Timeless or most popular | Human rights, Israel, Jerusalem, Palestine, Zionism | 4 Comments