Experts Warn Israel Lacks Authority to Overhaul West Bank Laws

(MENAFN) Legal specialists argue that Israel does not possess lawful power to permanently discard Jordanian-era legislation or substitute it with Israeli laws in the occupied West Bank. Instead, they say Israel’s authority is limited to temporarily halting such statutes through military directives derived from the military administration established in the territory after 1967.

“Practically, Israel can suspend Jordanian-era laws through military orders based on the military regime it imposed after 1967, but legally it does not have the right to permanently abolish these laws or replace them with its sovereign legislation," Issa Al-Shalabi, a professor of political science at Jordan’s Al-Hussein Bin Talal University, told a news agency during an interview.

The remarks followed decisions approved on Sunday by Israel’s Security Cabinet, which enable Israelis to buy land in the occupied West Bank.

These measures overturn long-standing Jordanian-era regulations that have governed land ownership since 1967 and expand Israeli administrative reach into zones currently under Palestinian civil administration.

As reported by an Israeli public broadcaster, the approved steps involve canceling a regulation that prohibited the sale of Palestinian land to Jews in the West Bank, opening previously sealed land registry files, and shifting authority over building permits in a settlement cluster near Hebron from the Palestinian local authority to Israel’s civil administration.

“Abolishing a law presupposes legal sovereignty, which does not exist internationally. This means Israel is imposing a fait accompli by force, not by legitimacy," Shalabi explained.

He further noted that easing land transactions for illegal settlers breaches UN Security Council Resolutions 242, 446, and 2334, and “may legally amount to a war crime.”

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