Talk:Sabri Jiryis

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Contents

[edit] about the 1969-1970 events

What is related here is based on the political autobiography by the Swedish/(Israeli) author Göran Rosenberg: The lost Country: Israel; a personal history. 1996. Chapter 12: "The land under the stones". Professor Rosenberg translated "The Arabs in Israel" into Swedish in 1970. He visited Sabri Jiryis in Haifa in January, 1970. Huldra 05:43, 15 October 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Defence (Emergency) Regulations

There should perhaps be an article about this? From Rosenberg:

The Defence (Emergency) Regulations, also named Defense Laws, were established by the British Mandate in 1945, mainly with the goal of fighting the Jewish extremist groups at the time. Yaákov Shimshon Shapira, later Israeli minister of Justice, stated at the time that "the system that was established with the Defence (Emergency) Regulations does not have its equal in any sivilized world. Not even Nazi-Germany has anything similar.."

The Defense Laws of the British Mandate were taken over by she state of Israel in 1948, and was renewed annually until 1972.

Using this as a legal base, the government created three areas or zones to be ruled by the Ministry of Defense:

  • the Northern Area, also known as the Galilee Area, the locale of about twothirds of the Arab population.
  • the socalled Little Triangle, located between the villages of Et Tira and Et Taiyiba near the border with Jordan (then Transjordan), officially known as the Central District.
  • a major part of the Negev Desert, a region traversed by the nomadic beduins.

Article 125 of the Defense (Emergency) Regulations empowered military governors to declare any specified area "offlimits " to those having no written authorization. The area was then declared a security zone and thus closed to Israeli Arabs who lacked written permission either from the army chief of staff or the minister of defense. Under these provisions, 93 out of 104 Arab villages in Israel were constituted as closed areas out of which no one could move without a military permit.

Emergency Regulations (Cultivation of Waste Lands) Ordinance: used to transfer to Jewish settlements land in the security zones that was lying fallow because the owner of the land was not allowed to enter the zone as a result of the above national security legislation.

Military Government ended in 1966.

See also: Fouzi El-Asmar: To Be An Arab in Israel (London: 1975),

Huldra 06:08, 15 October 2005 (UTC), Huldra 15:07, 15 October 2005 (UTC)

I have read, and heard it said, that the regulations were officially abrogated both by the British before leaving and by the Jordanians, in respect of the West Bank - and that their application by Israel is therefore without legal foundation - I'll see if I can find a source (it'll have to be an internet source) for this. Palmiro | Talk 17:12, 15 October 2005 (UTC)

[edit] (+ inf. about 1982+1983)

The information given here is taken from: "Prisoners of Israel" by: Edward Dillon, August - September 1983 The Link - Volume 16, Issue 3 AMEU [1] - Huldra 13:41, 15 October 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Sources

A political declaration by the UNGA is not a [{WP:RS]]. Surely you would not use a similar declaration to support a claim that Zionism is racism. You need to find a better source for that claim, or replace the claim with something along the lines of "The UNGA passed a resolution declaration that israel allegedly ransacked...". Also, the original claim was for the Instititue for Palestine Studies, not the Palestine Research Center. Isarig 15:32, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

I believe the original article was mistaken, and that Jiryis was actually director of the Palestine Research Centre, which was ransacked. I have restored this correction, and I'm seeking further backing. Note that there was no evidence cited that he was director of the Institute of Palestine Studies, which I believe to be wrong.
I'm sorry you don't like the UN source. But it is quite clear -- the UN determined that the Israeli army had indeed "seized and taken away" the archives of the PRC. re your suggestion about a UN finding that Zionism is racism, that is a matter of opinion, not fact; I would indeed accept such a declaration as establishing that a majority of states held that opinion. In this case, we are talking about material and established fact.
I have a further source, which you probably won't like any better: Jiryis' own testimony to the "International Commission to enquire into reported violations of International Law by Israel during its invasion of Lebanon". However, this is a book, not web, citation, and I am having difficulty formatting the appropriate note. Any help you ar any other editor could give me would be much appreciated.--RolandR 03:23, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
Ifre you wnat to use the UNGA resolution as a source, you must change the wording to reflect that this is an opinion of the UNGA, a political body. Its claims regarding the Palestine Research Center are no more factual than its claim (in that same resolution) that Israel is not a peace loving state, or that Jerusalem is an Arab territory. You are right that I do not like Jiryis's personal testimony eather. If this claim is to stay in the article, better sources need to be found. Isarig 06:27, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
Whaw: Katz is a reliable source, and UNGA is not? Well, I will let that rest for now. Instead;
        • firstly; where did he work? I´m really not sure any more; the link above say Palestine Research Centre, while the Haaretz link (at the bottom: "External") [2] say Institute for Palestine Studies. I am not familiar with the Palestine Research Centre, so I do not know the difference between it and the Institute for Palestine Studies.
        • secondly; it is quite well known, and quite undisputed that Israel looted/plundered/confiscated (call it whatever you like) all Palestinian archives etc. it found in Beirut in 1982. I think the official reason Israel gave was that they were looking for proofs of terrorist activities (or something like that. I might be wrong here.) Anyway: it should be added that Israel returned the material in 1983. This is what it says e.g. in Blaming the Victims, in a note, on p. 229: "In spite of conditions in Beirut, the PLO´s Palestine Research Center and the unaffiliated Institute for Palestine Studies produced som significant research until Israel´s 1982 invasion disrupted their functioning, and indeed much intellectual production. The Center´s historical archives were seized by occupying Israeli forces, but were returned as part of the November 1983 prisoner exchange with the PLO." I´m afraid I just now do not have any time to work on the article. Regards, Huldra 08:39, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
Huldra's comments and citation bear out my edits. First, re the IPS and the PRC: the IPS is an independent research institution, now back in Beirut after moving several times due to the wars in Lebanon. Although politically close to the PLO, it is organisationally and financially totally separate. The PRC is the research institute of the PLO; it is this that Jiryis was director of during his years in Beirut.
As for sources, the UN finding seems to me to be authoritative. Its statements that Israel is not a peace-loving state and that East Jerusalem was occupied by Israel in 1967 are equally true and factual. I don't understand why you won't accept the personal testimony of Sabri Jiryis -- the subject of the article, after all -- about the events of 1982. There is also the article by Jiryis and Salah Qallab in the Journal of Palestine Studies, Vol. 14, No. 4 (Summer, 1985), pp. 185-187 (not available online). But if you want independent confirmation, I would refer you to dozens of sources. For instance, Edward Said in conversation with Salman Rushdie, published in New Left Review I/160, November-December 1986 (not available online); or Rosemary Sayigh's article Seven Day Horror: How the Sabra and Shatila Massacre was Buried with the Victims, in The Palestine Chronicle, 12 September 2002 [3]; or the interview with Fawaz Turki, Palestine Chronicle, 20 March 2002 [4].
But of course, all of these are Palestinians, so you may reject them as biased and unreliable. So what about the major report by Israeli journalist Amnon Kapeliouk, Sabra & Chatila: Inquiry Into A Massacre (Belmont, Mass: Association of Arab-American University Graduates, 1984)? [5] Kapeliouk writes "The Israeli Army occupied the Palestine Research Center, where they confiscated all archives and documents found on the premises. Near the race-track, Israeli paratroopers burst into the sixth-floor apartment of the redoubtable Leila Khalid. They searched all the rooms, confiscating photographs and documents, including her passport. Place and date of birth: Haifa [Palestine], 1946".
As Huldra writes,the facts are undisputed, and I am going to restore the citation. RolandR 13:40, 24 November 2006 (UTC)


The UNGA is a political body, and it makes political declarations. Its resolutions are not 'findings of fact', and can't be used as sources for such. They can only used as sources for claims about what the UNGA declared. (for example: while Israel certainly captured the eastern part of Jerusalem in 1967, it was not, prior to that, "Arab territory" , or "Palestinian territory" - it was part of the former British Mandate for Palestine, designated by the 1947 partition plan to be a Corpus Sepratum, and then illegally occupied and annexed by Transjordan. So while the UNGA may declare it to be Arab territory, contradicting its own previous designation, that does not make it factually so). Katz, OTOH, is a historian, who wrote a book of history. No matter how much you dislike him personally, he qualiifes as a WP:RS per WP guidelines, and way may source calims to him (while noting his potential bias). The Edward Said claim from Blaming the Victims is a reliable source, and so I have updated the article to reflect what he says, in neutral language, and removed the non-WP:RS references. Isarig