The Israeli Supreme Court has demanded that the Israeli state prove that it was not directly discriminating against Palestinians in Israel and occupied East Jerusalem by passing a 2015 law that strips social benefits for Palestinian families whose children are convicted of stone-throwing, Ma’an News Agency reported.
According to Israeli newspaper Haaretz, the Israeli Supreme Court gave the state 45 days to produce legitimate reasoning as to how the decision to revoke social benefits of Palestinian families during the time their children are imprisoned for throwing stones did not “constitute a violation of the principle of equality before the law.”
The justices also imposed a temporary injunction on the order until the state provides acceptable reasoning for the law.
Israeli court extends detention of Palestinian teen over stone throwing https://t.co/hcvSUVN9ZI via @MaanNewsAgency #Palestine pic.twitter.com/7X309SF0Hu
— al whit (@soitiz) December 13, 2016
Adalah lawyer Sawsan Zaher was quoted by Haaretz as saying that the revocation of state benefits is a way for the state to “take revenge on parents of these children,” adding that the law was “a sweeping and impermissible act, contrary to essential principles of criminal law — which requires an examination of each individual on a case-by-case basis.”
“Discriminating against Palestinian minors while refraining from taking similar measures against other minors committing worse offenses, such as murder, rape and drug trafficking, actually creates one criminal law for Arab children and another one for Jews.”
The legislation is one of more than a dozen active laws in Israel identified by Adalah to be discriminatory against Palestinians.
(Ma’an, PC, Social Media)
