New Israeli entry rules for foreigners to the West Bank further isolate them Palestinians living there, and specific directives risk turning this occupied territory “into a new Gauze” Human Rights Watch (HRW) said today.

New entry rules to Gaza (with the exception of East Jerusalem, annexed by Israel) issued in February 2022 for foreigners wishing to reside, work, volunteer or study there have been strongly condemned by the EU, US and human rights organizations.

The effective date of the ruling was delayed following lawsuits, and Cogat, the Israeli Defense Ministry body that monitors civilian activity in the Palestinian territories, published a revised version of the measures in September that was also heavily criticized.

The new regulation is expected to be in effect for a two-year trial period, but its implementation is subject to great uncertainty.

“By making it harder for the world to stay in the West Bank, Israel is taking another step towards turning the West Bank into another Gaza, where two million Palestinians have been living effectively cut off from the world for more than 15 years,” the Observatory said. says in the ad.

“This policy is designed to weaken the social, cultural and spiritual ties that the Palestinians have sought to maintain with the outside world” and “threatens to further isolate the Palestinians, alienating them from their loved ones and global civil society,” she added. human rights public organization.

Israel has occupied the West Bank since 1967 and has imposed a blockade of the Gaza Strip since the Islamist movement Hamas took control of the territory in 2007.

Among the most controversial measures of the new West Bank regulation are those applied to foreign nationals seeking to integrate into Palestine or their Palestinian spouses.

Israel can also reject requests for family reunification of this kind if they are contrary to “political level directives”.

The new restrictions on foreigners who want to study, teach or do charity work in the West Bank “give the Israeli military more leeway,” HRW notes with regret.

In response to an AFP question, Cogat today did not respond to questions about the implementation of the new directives, nor to criticism from HRW.

Nearly 2.9 million Palestinians currently live in the West Bank, which is also home to 475,000 Israelis, in Jewish settlements illegal under international law that are scattered throughout the territory.

^{Source: APE-MEB, AFP.}