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Land Day (Template:Lang-ar, Yom al-Ard; Template:Lang-he, Yom Ha'adama), is an annual protest day for Palestinians, occurring on March 30, charging Israel with discriminating against the Arabs of the state, especially in the area of lands. On March 29-30, 1976 occurred the first such protest, then over Israeli expropriations of land in the Galilee, in which six Arab citizens were killed by the Israeli security forces during the initial violent outburst.

Historical background

The Arabs of Palestine were a largely agrarian people, 75% of whom made their living off the land before the establishment of the state of Israel in 1948. After the Palestinian exodus and the large-scale upheavals effected by the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, referred to by Palestinians as al-Nakba, land continued to play an important role in the lives of the 156,000 Palestinians who had remained inside what became the state of Israel.

Absentee Property Law

Israel's Absentees' Property Law of March 1950 transferred the right of owners of the land to a government-appointed Custodian of Absentee Property. The law was used to confiscate lands belonging to the over 750,000 Palestinians, the majority of whom fled their hometowns in 1948. It was also used to confiscate the lands of Arab citizens of Israel who "are present inside the state, yet classified in law as 'absent'." Today, there are an estimated 200,000 "present-absentees" or internally displaced Palestinians from among the estimated 1.2 million Arab citizens of Israel, representing over 16% of the Palestinian Arab population in Israel. More than a 1000 square kilometres of land were expropriated from Arab citizens of Israel alone between 1948 and 2003.

Catalyzing events

See also: The Koenig Memorandum

On February 29, 1976, the Ministry of Finance passed a decree calling for the confiscation of 21 km² (5,000 acres) of land between the Arab villages of Sakhnin and Arraba. Nayef Hawatmeh, leader of the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP), explains that, "These vast tracts of land were to be turned over to the construction of eight Jewish industrial villages, in implementation of the so-called Galilee Development Plan of 1975. In hailing this plan, the Ministry of Agriculture openly declared that its primary purpose was to alter the demographic nature of Galilee in order to create a Jewish majority in the area."

According to Orly Halpern of the The Jerusalem Post, the lands were initially confiscated for "security purposes," but were actually used to build new Jewish settlements and a military training camp.

The government decision to confiscate the land was accompanied by the declaration of a curfew to be imposed on the villages of Sakhnin, Arraba, Deir Hanna, Tur'an, Tamra, and Kabul, effective from 5 p.m. on March 29, 1976.

The Land Day Protest of 1976

Local Arab leaders from the Rakah party, such as Tawfiq Ziad, responded by calling for a day of general strikes and protests against the confiscation of lands to be held on March 30. A general strike and marches took place throughout the Arab towns, from the Galilee to the Negev.

During the protests, four unarmed demonstrators were shot by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and two more by police. At least 100 Arabs were wounded and many others jailed. The New York Times writes that the killings were carried out by police during "riots in the Galilee region to protest over Israeli expropriation of Arab land."

Yosef Goell, writing in The Jerusalem Post, says that, "What actually set off the rioting that led to the deaths was a wild attack by hundreds of inflamed young Arabs on an unsuspecting IDF convoy driving on the road by the villages of Sakhnin, Arrabe and Deir Hanna. There was no prior provocation on the part of that IDF convoy, unless one insists on seeing a provocation in the very presence of an Israeli army unit in the heart of Israeli Galilee." In annual commemorations of the day by Arab citizens, Israeli security forces are on alert but do not interfere in the protests.

Commemoration & significance

For Palestinians, Land Day has since become a day of commemoration and tribute to those who have fallen in the struggle to hold onto their land and identity. The Press Center of the Palestinian National Authority has characterized it "...as a remarkable day in the history of the Palestinian people's struggle, as the Palestinians in such a particular day embrace the land of their ancestors, their identity and their existence."

It often serves as a day for the expression of political discontent for Arab citizens of Israel, particularly surrounding issues of equal land and citizenship rights. The day is also commemorated annually by Palestinians in the West Bank, Gaza Strip, East Jerusalem, and further afield in refugee camps and among the Palestinian diaspora worldwide.

Calls to launch non-violent resistance protests to ongoing land confiscations regularly occur on Land Day. For example, the BADIL Resource Center for Palestinian Residency and Refugee Rights issues a press release for Land Day 2006, calling for "boycott, divestment, and sanctions against Israel" and an end to "racial discrimination, occupation, and colonization."

In recent years, Arab citizens of Israel have focused on expressing solidarity with their West Bank and Gazan brothers and sisters. In 2002, for example, Land Day demonstrations by Arab citizens of Israel also spoke out against the "Israeli siege of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat's headquarters."

In 2001 during the Second Intifada, a general strike and "Day of Rage" was called for by Palestinians on the anniversary of Land Day. Five Palestinians were killed in Nablus during stone-throwing protests where 10,000 had taken to the streets, and one Palestinian was killed in a half-hour exchange of gunfire at Ramallah, where 1,000 had marched on an Israeli checkpoint; many others were wounded by rubber bullets.

See also

• Equality Day

References

1. Uri Davis. "A Democratic State for all of its Citizens and Refugees". MidEast Journal 2001, Original Abridged version in Ha'aretz, June 25, 2001.
2. ^ Nayef Hawatmeh (7-13 April 2005, Issue No. 737). "Remembering Land Day". Al-Ahram Weekly Online. Retrieved 2006-11-01. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
3. ^ Orly Halpern (March 30, 2006). "Israel's Arabs to Mark Land Day". The Jerusalem Post, English Online Edition. Retrieved 2006-11-01.
4. Cite error: The named reference BBC was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
5. "Remembering Land Day". BBC News. March 30, 2001. Retrieved 2006-11-01.
6. "After the War: Arab Strike Held Only in Occupied Areas". New York Times. 1991-03-31. Retrieved 2006-02-01. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
7. Yosef Goell (March 262001). "Land Day? No: Call it 'Lie Day'". The Jerusalem Post. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
8. "On the eve of Land Day, Israel Continues Aggression". International Press Center, Palestine. 2006-05-09. Retrieved 2007-05-28. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= and |date= (help)
9. "Press Release: Palestine Land Day 2006". BADIL Resource Center for Palestinian Residency and Refugee Rights. 2006-03-30. Retrieved 2006-03-30. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
10. Agence France Press (2002-03-30). "Israeli Arabs Protest Against Arafat Siege on "Land Day"". Common Dreams News Center. Retrieved 2006-11-01. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
11. "At least 3 dead in Middle East clashes". CNN. March 30, 2001. Retrieved 2007-05-28. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
12. Jeffrey Heller (2001-03-31). "Six Palestinians Killed in Clashes". The Washington Post. pp. A.14. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help); Cite has empty unknown parameter: |1= (help)

External links

• 'The land speaks Arabic' / A public near its breaking point by Yoav Stern, Haaretz, March 31, 2008.
• Al Jazeera on 2006 protests
• BBC
• Daily Star
• Jerusalem Post
• Jewish Virtual Library
• Miftah

• Misplaced Pages neutral point of view disputes from August 2008
• Israeli-Palestinian conflict
• Politics of Israel
• March observances
• History of Israel