– by Erez Bleicher – Israeli military authorities are continuing to develop the legal architecture of occupation into an ever more refined system of segregation. The occupation has always been a system predicated on the separation of people from land, olive trees from farmers, sheep from pastures, and families from homes. The Israeli army has instituted this system of brutal divides through checkpoints, barbed wire, tear gas, night raids, and military might. During the summer of 2022, however, Israeli authorities attempted to take their ongoing policies of partition to an even more absurd extreme.

In a document titled “Procedure for entry and residence of foreigners in the Judea and Samaria area,” the Israeli military proposed a new set of regulations which would severely curtail the entry of foreign nationals into the West Bank. One particularly notable provision of the proposed regulations specifically stipulated that internationals must notify the military within 30 days of “forming a couple” with a Palestinian resident of the West Bank. The document states that an “official must be informed in writing within 30 days of the relationship’s start. At the same time, an application must be submitted to the Palestinian Authority for formalizing the status.”

The proposed provisions understandably drew the consternation and ire of many international bodies, including the European Union. Not the least of their concerns was, of course, the absurd nature of legislating love, affection, and the status of relationships. “Forming a couple” and the “start of a relationship” are so abstract and subjective in connotation that defining them legally would be almost comical if not for the context.

For example, one can imagine cliché conversations typical at the start of budding relationships quickly deviating from the standard Hollywood script.

“We need to talk,” one smitten lover would proclaim to the other after a few weeks of casual dating. Hearing the phrase so many new romantic partners dread, the second would sigh deeply and say, “You want to talk about our relationship status, right?”

“Right!” the first would enjoin, “If we don’t sort out our status by tomorrow night, I’ll be deported by the IDF.”

And trite debates around anniversary dates would take on an entirely different level of immediacy. One an imagine a harried university student from somewhere in the US or Europe being interrogated by the border police.

“Tell me when your relationship started,” a gruff officer would bark at the timid philosophy major seated across the table.

“Well, I think we had a magical moment when our eyes met at the cafe my first week here, but we didn’t really start talking for real until three days later. And, to tell you the truth, I was just lonely and in it for some company for a few weeks before I really started having feelings, so I don’t exactly know when it got serious.”

The officer would slam his fists on the table and yell, “Were you a couple and did your relationship start by September 7th at 8:29PM when you watched My Big Fat Greek Wedding together and ate malabi on the hillside at dusk?”

“I exercise my right to remain silent,” the student would finally quip as they blushed and looked at the ground in despair.

Comedic satire aside, the new regulations are the latest implements in the larger objective of the occupation to separate Palestinians in the West Bank, East Jerusalem, Israel, and Gaza from each other and from the broader world. Palestinian human rights organization like Adalah and Al-Haq have outlined for years the many ways Israeli policies deploy residency, citizenship, and family unification policies to engineer demographics and implement a calculated strategy of divide and conquer. By disrupting the contiguity of Palestinian civil society and cutting its ties to international communities, Israel hopes to foreclose the possibility of future Palestinian autonomy.

The specific provision stipulating that new couples report their status to the authorities was rescinded by the military a day later in a revised version of the procedures. All the other heightened restrictions on international students, academics, business people, and aid workers will be instituted despite international outcry. The military states the goals of the procedures are to “define the levels of authority and the manner of processing for applications from foreigners who wish to enter the Judea and Samaria area.” The crucial point to remember is that, according to international law, all Israeli civilians and military personnel are themselves foreigners in the territory and have no authority to administer the intimate lives of those within it. We must work toward a future in which Palestinians in the West Bank are able to love freely and build homes and families without the oversight of military law.