JERUSALEM, Israel – Israeli lawmakers failed to pass a compromise agreement early Tuesday after an all-night debate over a temporary law that bans Israeli Arab citizens from automatically extending citizenship or residency permits to their family members in the West Bank – biblical Judea and Samaria.
The Israeli parliament voted 59-59 on the compromise, which sought to extend the law by six months instead of a year. If the legislation had passed, a panel would have been established to examine long-term humanitarian solutions. Additionally, several hundred Palestinians who are married to Israelis and have lived in Israel for a significant amount of time would have been offered residency status.
The bill was a compromise to the so-called “family reunification” law, which was first enacted in 2003 and has been renewed annually ever since. It prevents Palestinians living in the West Bank or Gaza who marry Israeli citizens from permanently living with their spouses in Israel. The legislation creates an array of difficulties for Palestinian families separated across the war-drawn boundary lines of Israel, the West Bank, and eastern Jerusalem.
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The legislation designed to improve security inside Israel came during the Second Intifada that began in September of 2000 when a wave of Palestinian terrorism claimed the lives of more than 1,000 Israelis in dozens of suicide bombings and scores of terror attacks. Twenty-three of those attacks involved persons from the West Bank or Gaza who were granted legal status in Israel based on their marriage to an Israeli citizen, according to Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs. They took advantage of their Israeli ID to pass checkpoints and carry into Israel either suicide bombers of explosives. One major attack took place in Haifa in March 2002 when a suicide bomber who received an Israeli ID following family unification killed 15 people.
Historically, Israel’s right-wing parties have supported the law, arguing that some of the Palestinians who enter Israel could engage in terrorism. But the right-wing opposition parties led by former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said they would vote against the new law in an effort to embarrass the newly instated government.
Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett on Monday accused the opposition of playing “childish games.”
“The entry of thousands of Palestinians and them becoming citizens, and harming state security for a quarter of a political point is not the right thing to do,” he said.
Critics of the law, which include left-wing and Arab lawmakers, argue that the law is racist and is deliberately aimed at stunting the growth of Israel’s Arab minority. Supporters say the law is needed for security reasons and to preserve Israel’s Jewish character.
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