Yesterday, Wednesday, May 22, Israeli occupation forces have cut the Gaza Strip in half, barring Palestinians from moving between the southern and northern areas.

Israel effectively maintains apartheid-style policies to enforce its control and military occupation and cut the West Bank into eight bantustans,effectively isolated from one another, with movement control exercised by the Israeli occupation forces.

Palestinians needing to travel are required to apply to the Israeli occupation authorities for a special permit to enter or leave a zone. The new permits (or 'passbooks') are only valid from 5.00 am until 7.00 pm and must be renewed every month.

This measure resembles the system of 'pass laws' as used by the apartheid regime in South Africa, where black South Africans were confined to reserves and their movements restricted to certain places after specified hours under restrictive laws.

Israel's restrictions on Palestinian movement, its
besiegement on Palestinian towns, villages and refugee camps and Israel's closure policy already has had a devastating effect on all aspects of the lives of the Palestinian civilian population, including access to supplies such as food and medicines, humanitarian aid and assistance, hospitals and field clinics, schools,
universities, and workplaces, and access to religious sites.

The Israeli army has literally imprisoned the Palestinian population in restricted areas by the widespread use of trenches, barbed wire, and dirt and concrete blockades that prevent movement outside of towns and villages. Previously, LAW reported about the more than 150 military checkpoints, dirt and concrete blockades cutting off access to city and country roads, trenches cutting off main access roads to urban centres and iron gates that have been erected at entrances of Palestinian community areas.

Article 12 of the Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which Israel ratified in 1991, states that everyone shall have the right to liberty of movement, without restriction, in his or her country, and the right to enter and leave it without hindrance.

According to the UN Committee Against Torture, Israel's policy of closures may amount to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment in breach of article 16 of the Torture Convention, which Israel ratified in 1991.

Moreover, the effects of the apartheid policies imposed by the Israeli occupation authorities on Palestinians
violate other legal duties to which Israel is subject, primarily the right to work, the right to health, and the right to education, as they appear in the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights.

Additionally, the restrictions are based on racial discrimination. Moreover, the new measures are a clear form of collective punishment, which is absolutely prohibited by the Fourth Geneva Convention.

The form of apartheid Israel applies against Palestinians fulfils all elements of the crime of apartheid as defined under the International Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid (1976), which expressly states that the crime of apartheid 'shall include similar policies and practices of racial segregation and discrimination as practiced in southern Africa' (art.2).

LAW condemns these flagrant violations of human rights and calls on the international community to condemn racial segregation and apartheid and undertake to prevent, prohibit and eradicate all practices of this nature in the Occupied Palestinian Territories. LAW urges the
international community to take effective measures to dismantle Israel's apartheid system, lift the closure and siege on Palestinian towns and villages and and ensure the freedom of movement.

LAW - The Palestinian Society for the Protection of Human Rights and the Environment is a non-governmental organisation dedicated to preserving human rights through legal advocacy. LAW is affiliate to the International Commission of Jurists (ICJ), the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH), and the World Organisation Organisation Against Torture (OMCT)

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