WASHINGTON — Less than an hour after a terror attack in Jerusalem killed three people, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu delivered a succinct message: Destroy the Palestinian attacker’s home.
Relatives of Palestinian AbdelRahman al-Shaludi, blamed for killing two Israelis in a deadly vehicular attack, inspect the their family home after it was destroyed by Israeli forces in Silwan neighborhood, Nov. 19, 2014. (Salih Zeki Fazlioglu/Getty)
“Prime Minister Netanyahu has decided to take immediate action to seal and demolish the home of the terrorist,” said the statement from Netanyahu’s office.
For decades, Israel has used the tactic as an instrument of punishment, saying that the effect of tearing down the homes of terrorists deters future attacks.
Critics say that home demolitions constitute collective punishment that violates international law.
Yet, the home demolition practice, like many others related to security, generates little political opposition.
While the Israeli Supreme Court can delay home demolitions, it almost always ultimately permits them to go forward.
Here’s how the practice of Israeli home demolition began and how it’s viewed in Israel and abroad.
Why does Israel destroy the homes of terrorists?
Israel began demolishing homes of Palestinian attackers after it captured the West Bank, East Jerusalem and the Golan Heights in the 1967 Six Day War.
Since then, according to a 2019 assessment by the Israel Democracy Institute, Israel has demolished some 2,000 homes due to terrorism. The demolitions have taken place in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, not within Israel’s pre-1967 borders.
Israel says that demolishing the homes of terrorists acts as a deterrent, a rationale cited last month in a bill introduced by lawmaker Eliahu Revivo, a member of Netanyahu’s Likud Party who also wants to deter attacks by deporting the families of terrorists.
“The national security establishment and the Israeli army have conducted research over the years into dozens of suicide attackers, and it emerged that the one deterrent for suicide attackers is what the consequences for their families will be after the attack,” the text of the bill said.
Home demolitions were largely suspended in 2005 after the Israel Defense Forces found that the practice had no discernible deterrent effect. The demolitions were sporadically reinstated a few years later and fully brought back by Netanyahu in November, 2014 during a wave of Palestinian attacks.
A 2010 research paper by political scientists at Northwestern University and The Hebrew University suggested that home demolition works as a deterrent.
The authors of the study based their findings on an examination of home demolitions in the five years prior to the army’s 2005 suspension, a period that coincided with the second intifada.
“We show that punitive house demolitions (those targeting Palestinian suicide terrorists and terror operatives) cause an immediate, significant decrease in the number of suicide attacks,” the paper said. “The effect dissipates over time and by geographic distance.”
This year, Netanyahu’s government has indicated it will accelerate and expand the demolition of the homes of terrorists.
It recently ordered the closing-off of an apartment belonging to the family of a 13-year-old who shot and wounded two Israelis near Jerusalem’s Old City.
The move was unusual because Israel had previously reserved home demolition for attackers who killed people.
Is demolishing terrorists’ homes legal?
Yes, according to Israel.
Israel bases its argument on a regulation from 1945, when Britain controlled what is now Israel, that was carried over into Israeli law when the state was established in 1948. It is known as “Defense regulation (emergency) 1945, regulation 119.”
The regulation is broadly written, allowing a “A Military Commander” to destroy the home of “anyone who offended, or attempted an offense, or assisted offenders or abetted offenders after the fact,” as determined by a military court.
International law experts say that home demolition is illegal under international law because it is a form of collective punishment, which is banned by the Geneva Conventions.
Israel has long argued that the Geneva Conventions do not apply to its presence in territories it has captured, because the land in question was not the internationally recognized territory of any state in the world prior to 1967.
The Biden administration considers home demolitions to be collective punishment.
“We attach a good deal of priority to this, knowing that the home of an entire family shouldn’t be demolished for the action of one individual,” State Dept. spokesman Ned Price said in 2021.
Who owns the land once a home is demolished?
Under the 1945 regulation, military authorities maintain control of the land, and it reverts to the original owners — if they are present — once military authorities leave.
How long does it take for a home demolition to take place? What happens to the family?
Generally, the military consults with Israel’s intelligence services before ordering a home demolition. In the case of high-profile attacks, however, the order may come down immediately, as it did on Feb. 10.
Families have 48 hours to appeal a demolition to the military commander or another relevant authority.
However, Israel’s Supreme Court has reserved the right to review demolition orders. This may delay demolition for months or years, but in the majority of cases the court ultimately upholds the demolition.
In one case in 2018, the court stopped the demolition after the family presented evidence showing that the assailant suffered from a mental illness.
Homes may be demolished by bulldozers. Apartments or rooms are generally filled with cement, rendering them unlivable. Families sometimes split up among relatives, at least in the near term, according to a UN report.
According to the Jerusalem Post, the army commission that recommended ending the practice in 2005 reported that families of the terrorists often rebuild their homes with compensation funds from the Palestinian Authority and other sources.
The PA pays monthly stipends to the families of Palestinians imprisoned by Israel or killed while committing violent attacks.
Does Israel demolish the homes of Jewish terrorists?
No. The Palestinian family of a boy murdered by a Jewish terrorist sued to have his killer’s home destroyed. The Supreme Court in 2017 rejected the lawsuit, saying too much time had passed since the 2014 murder.
The government argued that deterrence was not necessary in the case of Jewish terrorism, because, in the words of Judge Neal Hendel, Jewish terrorists are “a minority of a minority of a minority.”
Israeli Arab politicians, including Knesset member Ahmed Tibi, had called on the government to demolish the Jewish terrorist’s house as a matter of fairness.
The Israeli government counted a total of 16 Jewish attacks of terrorism in 2015, according to the Jerusalem Post.
