מקום מבטחו של אללה? - jerusalem institute

Allah’s Safe Haven?The Controversy Surrounding the Mamilla Cemetery and the Museum of Tolerance

Contesting Domination over the Symbolic and Physical Landscapes

Yitzhak Reiter

©

© 2011, The Jerusalem Institute for Israel StudiesThe Hay Elyachar House

20 Radak St., 92186 Jerusalem

http://www.jiis.org.il

E-mail: [email protected]

War, Peace and International Relations in Islam: Muslim Scholars on Peace Accords with Israel (Sussex Academic Press and the Jerusalem Institute for Israel Studies, 2011);

National Minority, Regional Majority: Palestinian Arabs versus Jews in Israel(Syracuse University Press, 2009);

Jerusalem and its Role in Islamic Solidarity (New York: Palgrave Macmillan and the Jerusalem Institute for Israel Studies, 2008).

iii Abstract

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The United Nations, Human Rights Council, thirteenth session, Agenda item 7, "Human Rights.situation in Palestine and other occupied Arab territories", GE. 10-12403, 13 March 2010

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مأمن الله ماملا

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The Simon Wiesenthal Center's new Israel Project — The Center forHuman Dignity in Jerusalem — attempts to give institutional substanceto the popular injunction that we should ‘think globally, but act locally’.The Center will take the broad lessons about tolerance promotion that wehave learned over the past decade in the United States and tailor themto the distinctive realities of a diverse Israel and the Middle East values

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crucible…A moral and ethical beacon light for tree of the world's greatreligions, Jerusalem is the contested ground where a shared faith in thesacredness of human dignity took shape, and where common groundin shared values of human rights must be reclaimed. Our ultimatehope is that The Center for Human Dignity, Museum of Tolerance,Jerusalem, will develop into a global hub that will promote civilityand mutual respect among the multiplicity of peoples of the MiddleEast as well as international visitors of all faiths and origins.

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Israel”

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waqf وقف

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Jewish State (New York: SUNY, 2001)

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العام الوقف

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4

Yitzhak Reiter, “Qadis and the Implementation of Islamic Law in Present Day Israel”, in RobertGleave and U. Kermeli (eds.), Islamic Law in Theory and Practice

Tauris, 1997), pp. 205-231

65

Reiter, “Qadis and the Implementation of Islamic Law in Present Day Israel”

Yitzhak Reiter, “Judge Reform: Facilitating Divorce by Shari`a Courts in Israel”, Journal of Islamic.Law and Culture, 11:1 (March 2009), pp.13-38

66

SJD

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www.knesset.gov.il/protocols/data/rtf/pnim/2006-02-15.rtfReiter, “Judge Reform”

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.World: Studies in Honor of Aharon Layish (Leiden: ,2007), chapter 10

;Reiter, “Judge Reform”

and L. Hammer (eds.), Religion and Politics in Israel/Palestine: Sacred Spaces (London and New.York: Routledge, forthcoming in 2011)

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IIIII

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ynet

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necessity and laudable purposes

Respect for the dead does not require that land once used as a burial If

that were so, the dead would in time crowd the living off the face of the earth.

A. 2d 510 1959

153

Native American GraveProtection and Repatriation Act

... Generally, human remains will not be disinterred unless construction, or some other procedure, is going to disturb them anyway, but the existence of the legislation itself suggests a tacit acceptance of the primacy of

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the living over the dead and a willingness to disturb human remains if it appears necessary.

Vines, p 11

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233vi

side can still take the struggle to other, less comfortable, venues such as the

sensitivity within the international community. It is therefore worth considering the establishment of a special inter-religious body under government auspices

possible.

v

to the degradation of the cemetery in Mamilla; the museum’s initiators are not

used as a parking lot for at least two decades before the planning of the museum started.

The case of Mamilla offers a number of political lessons regarding the eruption

cemeteries in Israel:

1. Every plot of land that was of past importance for the religious and cultural heritage of a minority community, or that was a burial site, could serve as a

and property zoning authorities, and planning bodies need to be aware of this possibility and take it into account during zoning or construction approval processes.

2. Activities that were characteristic of government authorities in the early days

cemeteries on the basis of agreement with a Muslim qadi (shri`a court judge),

nationally and internationally.

3. Downplaying or concealing the heritage of property intended for construction from the eyes of the public is usually not effective and will likely be exposed, leading to more aggressive measures on the part of the opposing side.

4. The activities of Jewish bodies and of the State of Israel to preserve Jewish cemeteries in Europe as well as heritage sites and Jewish cemeteries in other countries could be negatively impacted as a result of the damage done to historical cemeteries in Israel (as distinct from accidental damage to graves whose existence was unknown before construction began).

construction in cemeteries because a judicial decision is only a locally

iv

generally.

2. The political level in the context of majority-minority relations. This case has raised a number of issues regarding the standing of the Arab-Muslim minority in Israel in the following contexts: the right to representation in the public domain and the meaningful landscape; the right to equal treatment by the state regarding rights to places of heritage and holy places; and the right to administer holy properties (waqf) according to religious law and the rulings of religious (Shari’a) courts. In this context, the Shari’a regarding a non-operational cemetery is also examined, and factual and interpretational precedents are discussed. This issue, in addition, has raised the question of the treatment of Muslim and Jewish cemeteries within Israel: Is the treatment fair or is it discriminatory?

separately from the ideological and political positions that it represents.

competent to discuss issues that have a religious element and relate to other religious communities? Is the court the appropriate venue to adjudicate

instances of construction on cemeteries: (1) Mamilla involves an initiative that is intended to symbolize tolerancereached the court casts a shadow over the initiative and its goal; (2) The cemetery in question is large, historical, important, and situated in a city of religious importance for the three monotheistic religions; and (3) The substantial number of graves discovered in Mamilla. These elements have been raised by opponents of the construction at the site of Mamilla. Initiators and supporters of the museum’s construction have countered with the following claims: The Muslim community neglected the place over the course of many years; the Islamic movement led an ideologically charged struggle for identity against the state and the symbolic

iii

Abstract

In February 2010, 15 Palestinian organizations and 60 dignitaries from East Jerusalem undertook a public relations campaign against an initiative (supported by Israel) to build a Museum of Tolerance on a plot of land that had in the past

municipal parking lot in the 1980s. The campaign organizers approached United Nations agencies and other international bodies, requesting that they investigate the issue and instruct Israel to halt construction, to preserve the cemetery as an antiquity, and to rebury the human remains that had been removed during construction. This campaign could gain additional momentum if the government of Israel continues with its plan to build a “Compound of Justice” (Heykhal HaMishpat, to house the Jerusalem courts of all instances) where the a school previously stood, on a plot that adjoins the one where the Museum of Tolerance is being built and that had also been part of the Mamilla cemetery. It is expected that the deep excavations needed to lay the museum’s foundation will lead to the exposure of hundreds of Muslim graves and human remains and to further widespread, resounding reactions. The reason that activities against establishment of the museum have risen to the international level is that in late 2008 the Supreme Court of Israel, in its capacity as the High Court of Justice, denied the petition submitted at the initiative of the Northern Islamic Movement against the construction of the museum in the intended site.

human dignity (respect for the deceased) and the urban development interests of

and the sensitivities of the Muslim-Arab minority, with its need for symbols of identity in the local and national landscapes.

The main issues addressed in this book are analyzed at three levels:

Jerusalem, including the internal Israeli public debate over a building project with an a priori

The JIIS Studies Series no. 409

Allah’s Safe Haven?The Controversy Surrounding the Mamilla Cemetery and the Museum of Tolerance


Yitzhak Reiter

© 2011, The Jerusalem Institute for Israel StudiesThe Hay Elyachar House

20 Radak St., 92186 Jerusalem

http://www.jiis.orgE-mail: [email protected]

The Jerusalem Institute for Israel StudiesEstablished by the Charles H. Revson Foundation

Allah’s Safe Haven?The Controversy Surrounding the Mamilla Cemetery

and the Museum of Tolerance


Yitzhak Reiter

2011

מקום מבטחו של אללה? - jerusalem institute

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